[Ilugc] Is the proprietary camp winning ?
- From: vamlists@xxxxxxxxx (Vamsee Kanakala)
- Date: Sun Oct 15 11:45:31 2006
Sivakumar Ma wrote:
Why the research activity should take place inside private companies?
Research is the domain of universities and publicly funded institutes.
The
model has been tried and tested to create new discoveries and innovations
over centuries.
Why not? You're forgetting that most academic projects go nowhere near a
market, and most of them continue to remain 'of academic interest'. If
they do, they will take a long time to mature into marketable
technologies. I'm not saying universities play any lesser role in
innovation - their role is indisputable in basic research, which most
companies shy away from.
To add to that, most of the next-big-break-through comes not from large
corporations but from the university labs and young students backyard.
Not always. One can also argue that corporations have a better feel of
the market, and what technology/product might or might not work. They
have a more ready understanding of the current big problems faced by the
industry and are willing to deploy significant capital if you can
provide a solution.
Just imagine the cash held on to by Microsoft coporation (30+ billion
dollars), and how it could have fuelled innovation if released to the
shareholders.
I doubt it, unless you 'release' the money to universities (for specific
projects) or fund startups with that money. Most shareholders of big
companies are pension funds, institutional investors and regular people
employed in other fields, but are interested in making money on the
stock market. Paying dividends would make them happy, but not much apart
from that.
After all corporations exist to serve the society, not the other way
around.
The society made specific laws to allow formations of companies to
carry out
specific economic activities, which can not be carried out by
individuals.
When the companies step outside the boundaries, they have to be held
back.
Excuse me? Corporations don't exist to 'serve' the society. They can
solve your problems - provide facilities - provided you can pay the
money. They are not morally obligated to serve the society, but they do
anyways because they create jobs, increase your standard of living,
deploy capital efficiently, etc. Are you, as an individual, obligated to
'serve' the society? It's your choice. So why do the rules change for
corporations? After all, they are just a bunch of people operating under
a common entity. If they want to make money, they have equal right to
take the position.
(of course, we all 'serve' the society much better than most NGOs by
paying taxes - which of course, is possible only if there are enough
jobs to go around - and we all agree it's the premise of the private
enterprise)
Am not sure FOSS business model is definitively advantageous to
society (of
which the hacker community is only a subset) than proprietary ones.
It is!
As the saying goes, 'it depends'. It's beneficial in the way that it
reduces the barriers for startups to operate - and students to gain
hands-on knowledge. But when you want to build a company with a
definitive competitive advantage, you can't afford to throw your source
code away. Because, your technology is what gives you the competitive
advantage. Yeah, you can use open source tools, definitely (yes, I'm
hinting at big G) but your 'crown jewels' cannot be open-source. They
set you apart from the rest of the pack - you build your products with
blood, sweat and money for a reason.
Do we expect a company like Apple or Sony to give away it's hardware
design plans? No. It's highly secret, their future as a corporation
depends on them. It's their right to have it & keep it secret because
they invested in it, and they expect a reasonable return for it. You
think you can do better? Sure, go ahead, start another company.
Vamsee.
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