Glee Blog Article

Date: August 2, 2003: The GLEE Software Public Funding Model (SPFM):

Abstract:

Glee wants to be forever free to its users. Developers of Glee want to be financially free. This presents a dilemma. A possible solution may be what I'm dubbing GSPFM ... the Glee Software Public Funding Model. A goal is to induce effort that produces desired results. Another goal is to reward people for their efforts. A goal is to be free of government intervention. A public solution needs is to be totally open. Perhaps a model similar to the one used in funding political parties would work.

Article:

Some background:

The last few days have been consumed by two distractions which are linked. One is the search for funds to pay for my software development efforts. The other was to search for people interesed in accelerating those efforts. I am constantly networking to find a way to fund Glee development. Let's cut to the chase. Glee has been under development for nearly four years and has consumed some 50 million developer seconds of effort. At a penny a second that's about $500,000. But Glee isn't done and it isn't worth $500,000 yet. Glee will some day be close to done worth far more than $500,000 in terms of the productivity improvements it enables. How do we reconcile current costs with future value and features?

In searh of the answer, let's consider two other software development efforts; their early value and cost; and their later value and reward to their creators. The two I will contrast are Microsoft software and Open Source Software (OSS).

Many of you are familiar with Microsoft Basic and MSDOS. The cost of these two pieces of software was known in 1980. Their value was not known then. As it turns out, the owners of MSBasic and MSDOS used the prostitute model. They sold it and they still had it. This is a very nice model indeed.

OSS developers like Richard Stallman and Linus Torvalds began putting significant effort into creating software. They garnered support from their friends in the form of code contributions. The cost of these efforts could be said to have been zero because the developers and their friends received no payment for their efforts. And they offered the fruits of their labor free to all who wanted it. The only restriction was that if others modified the software and added to it, they too must make those additions free and open to the public. They created and worked under the General Public License (GPL http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html ). This model is problematic. Its only form of remuneration is recognition. Recognition, while not completely devoid of nutritional value, does not sustain life in an organism. Yet the OSS developers have somehow provided for themselves and their families and have thoroughly enjoyed the effort.

Both Microsoft products and OSS have now produced something of nearly equal value to users. These creations emerged under two different economic models.

In the Microsoft case, the developers created and acquired rights (rights are defended claims); sold those rights (licenses); added to the claims (created more software) and defended their claims (got people to pay real money); and today have produced a collection of rights which produce revenue in the neighborhood of $25 Billion per year. Further, the stake these developers and their supporters (stockholders) hold in those rights makes these developers and their colleagues among the most valuable people on earth. This value is quantified by the number of things they can acquire in trade for their shares of those rights.

The other case, the OSS case, has not made its developers nearly as valuable. In total, these developers have invested more than the developers of Microsoft's products and have not reaped a dime for their efforts. Quantifying their value as the amount of things they can exchange for their rights, it is zero. They have no rights and thus have nothing to trade. But the product of their efforts is now seriously jeopardizing the value of the rights of the Microsoft developers. Why? Because OSS developed software is becoming very competitive with Microsoft developed software. OSS development gives everyone rights to this software at no cost. That's good. Those who contributed nothing benefit equally with those who contributed a lot. That's not good.

What's wrong with this picture? The Microsoft model users routinely trade many dollars just for the right to use the software. The OSS model users routinely trade nothing for the right to use the software. The Microsoft model developers routinely guild their cages. The OSS model developers can only bask in recognition from their peers ... recognition provided by having their names listed (all equally) as contributors to the development. This OSS model is very socialistic. The Microsoft model is very opportunistic.

Now, if you contrast these two models, you see that they are slowly producing the same result in terms of what the software will do. And right now they have dramatically different costs to their customers... zero for OSS vs. something very much non-zero for Microsoft. So what is the effect of this? If you understand people's buying habits (they'll pay as little as possible for as much as they can get), you have to conclude that the value of all this effort was zero. Software (from Microsoft or OSS) performing virtually the same function can be acquired from one place for some amount of dollars and from another place for zero dollars. You don't average here folks. The lower of the two dictates the value for both.

In the Microsoft model, the developers reaped much trading power over the voyage that produced this software... they got very rich (if they sold some of their rights). In the OSS model, the developers reaped recognition. Their ability to trade this for other things was essentially zilch. And in the end, the rights which Microsoft owners hold are worth zilch. Returning to the prostitute model ... how do you sell something when others are giving it for free?

I personally believe both models are unsustainable. You can not live by recognition alone, and you cannot compete profitably with something that costs nothing. So how do new things get done?

The Political Party and Software Party Funding Model:

People need to be paid for their efforts. And people's efforts have different values. My value as a dress designer is less than zero. As a drywaller it is slightly greater than zero. And as a software developer, it is much greater than zero. As a developer, I'm competing with people who are willing to work for recognition alone. I for one am not so willing. I need to find a way in which people vote to use my work and I vote to let them.

Does this sound a little like our present model for political parties? People make small contributions to the party they think will create laws they like and fight laws they don't. People make large contributions to the candidate they think will listen to them and do their bidding. They make these contributions with no claim to a return on them. The parties that collect these contributions do make promises to deliver on their platforms. The parties are not taxed on their use of contributions to deliver on the platform. Quite the contrary, the government subsidizes the parties by allowing tax deductions for those who make contributions.

Could such a model work for software development? Maybe. What would it look like?

Political parties supposedly support laws they like and fight laws they don't like. Political parties form around platforms which represent the party's views. Political party platforms, by nature of a contest, differ from each other. They do the same thing ... support some laws and fight others. When political parties work best (which is not what we have now in the USA), these laws are not identical sets. Rather, they are opposing sets. And the donors believe they benefit by participating in this little tug-of-war. They choose a party and its platform according to their beliefs and desires and they donate to it. It's all very free market oriented ... and undemocratic.

Software Development Parties could have a platform which describes the software they propose to support or develop. They will offer this software and support to the public at no charge. The public in turn will contribute to that Software Development Party which promises to produce software they would use ... and which delivers on those promises. New parties will form that are all promises and no delivery. Others will form by bringing their rights (again defended claims) to the party as a credential. They will say I am offering this work to the public for free ... and if you support me, there is more where that came from.

The SPFM differs from the OSS model. With the OSS model, the source code is in the open. Once there, it loses all value. No one can trade it for so much as a loaf of bread. This OSS model is not sustainable. The SPFM model is similar to the OSS model. The end users of the software enjoy it at not cost to themselves.

The SPFM is similar to the Microsoft model. The SPFM software is not in the public domain. The control of it and the ownership of the rights to it are owned by individuals or by entities. Those individuals or entities can sell those rights and control at any time to whom ever they choose at any price they can get. Thus, those rights have real value. This model differs from the Microsoft model. The SPFM created software is free to the end users. The owners of the control and rights are maintained as public information at all times. The donors to the software party and their contributions are maintained as public information at all times. The detailed uses of the donations are maintained as public information at all times. The reasons for all this public openess is to give the public protection from corruption without inviting government taxation and regulation.

The government is you and me and our neighbors. It is not this "other thing" which we call "the government". It is not different from ourselves. We form governments to defend our claims (our rights being those defended claims). We form governments to provide collective resources where private provision is

created is always provided to users at zero cost, the control and rights of ownership of that software are not in the public domain. The control and rights of ownership may be sold to others for something of value. And the owners of those rights are free to do whatevery they want with the donations as long as they say what they are doing with them. You will know that you will always be able run the resulting software product for free. You will know that you will always be able to resell the resulting software product for whatever you can charge. You will know that if donations to this software party are not sufficient to sustain development and support, that that development and support will cease. You will know who is contributing to the software party. And you will know where those contributions are going. owned by someone or some group. I would hope that the parties producing results which people want would garner more donations than those just promising results or producing results people don't want.

In my next BLOG article I intend give these ideas more definition ... to move the abstract to the concrete. As I write this I'm sort of thinking out loud. It is becoming more and more interesting to me ... kind of like the characters a novelist develops which then go on to tell his story.

I'll continue I welcome input and critique (mailto: GFPM@WithGLEE.com). If I don't come up with a model to fund my Glee work, my Glee work will stop. I don't want it to stop, so for now development of some funding model is on my critical path. Please stay tuned.