Dick Davies' handout to the Harvard Business School Washington DC Alumni

1. Open Source Changes Business
As enterprise IT solutions grew, paid
support didn’t scale with it. Users were
forced to find alternative solutions.
DICK DAVIES
The best customer service is no HTTP://THROUGHTHEBROWSER.BLOGSPOT.COM
customer service – The visit to Ning. WWW.DICKDAVIES.COM
The question is “How do you make
your business pay? Google proved
advertising. There will be other models.
Anything coming out of an internet
browser better be free.
Controlling the internet is like boiling
the ocean. Winners work with the best. What is Web 2.0…
Linus’s Law - "Given enough eyeballs,
all bugs are shallow"
And Why Should You Care?
Microsoft FUD Three Web 2.0 Discriminators That
“Open source and Microsoft were never Allow Companies To Grow to a
really enemies in the first place. Open Billion Dollars in Under Ten Years
source is a business model. Microsoft is
a company. It’s like pitting a noun
against a verb.” Dana Blankenhorn
Microsoft hosts 2008 Open Source
Awards, becomes a Platinum Sponsor DICK DAVIES
of the Apache Foundation (A patchy
server). PRESENT@DICKDAVIES.COM
International Association of Microsoft
Certified Partners (IAMCP) already
uses open source organizing and
management practices to compete.
“The future is already here, It’s just not
evenly distributed.” William Gibson
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2. Introduction The Internet Changes Business Web 2.0 Changes Business
September 2008 was Google’s tenth Potential Prospects/Customers – Web 1.0 – Brochureware websites and
birthday. We are watching a new Finding enough prospects no longer an shopping cart software. One way
paradigm, from startup to a billion issue. (If everyone in China pays us a broadcast and rudimentary purchasing
dollars valuation in less than ten years. penny, we’ll be RICH!) of defined offerings.
This has been accomplished several Uses beyond eyeballs/sales Web 2.0 – “All marketing is a
times, so we will look at three conversation” (Cluetrain Manifesto)
Search – Has changed how business is
companies. increased access to feedback and
planned, designed, and executed.
Looking at some common enablers, guidance from stakeholders. Increases
Modeling – “A model is a simplified data stored on the web.
they are – Internet, Web 2.0, and Open
version of reality” Mythical Man
Source Management. Web 3.0 – Repurposing the data stored
Month. Analysis has always run into the
wall of computing capability and on the web. Mashups, Tony Blair,
The Companies
available data. “Should I stay or should I go?”
Google – $140B ten years. Changed the http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1v
index of the web, overtook Yahoo. 200 BC Eratosthenes determined the wKZiDsY4 and “Where did the
circumference of the earth from the Presidents’ children go to school?
Revolutionized advertising value.
difference of the sun’s shadow between Freebase Parallax
Leader/organizer of global open source two points. http://blogs.zdnet.com/collaboration/?p
development. =131&tag=nl.e539
9/8/2008 Google Launches GeoEye-1
FCC Bandwidth gambit put open Web 2.0 Summary – No one is the sole
satellite which can show objects on the
source on wireless networks source of information on any subject
ground as small as 16 inches.
Chrome changes the IT security any more. Anyone can post an opinion.
Kevin Kelley in The Technium defines
paradigm, will change use of open What we lose in content control, we
the “Google Way of Science”
source for distribution. make up in amount of information
http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archive
available. Welcome to the knowledge
Facebook - $15B, founded 2004, 53 s/2008/06/the_google_way.php. If you
economy.
million users, 500 employees, 400,000 can use all the data, you don’t need a
independent Facebook developers. model. It is now easier than it has ever been to
be a contributing part of the internet.
Ning $500M valuation in 2006, Of course, if you have a million data
New tools give us incredible
founded 2004. Currently 453,962 social points, there is a new business making
capabilities. Blogs, commenting, wiki’s,
networks (each one like Facebook). sense of unimaginable information, like
and social networks are all easily
Gene Allen’s www.decisionincite.com
“Open Social” broke the available and leverage reach to tens of
Facebook/MySpace duopoly thousands of people.
Customer base as marketing driver.