Tim O’Reilly thinks a lot

Mon, 23 Jun 2003 16:01:00 -0400
/technology

Thanks to a (hopefully not too impressionist) “Impressionistic transcript” from Cory Doctorow, we can sample Tim O’Reilly’s incredible brain dump at Reboot:

We’re in the middle of another paradigm shift:
Linux critic: Linux isn’t user-friendly

Linux geek: Linux will be better in the next rev

They’re both wrong: the apps that run on Linux are Google,
Amazon, etc. Not shrinkwrapped apps, but new platforms.

Platforms made a lot more financially viable, precisely because they run on free software and commodity hardware.

This ties up with Jason Pellerin’s point that LAMP is a saviour much more than Mozilla.

Shirky’s “Listening to Napster:” You can build a big database by:
1. Paying people (Yahoo)

2. Getting volunteers (DMOZ)

3. Architect the system so that users’ natural activity yeilds a
database (Napster)

That’s the secret of what’s happening on the Internet today.
Every time you make a link, you contribute to Google. Amazon
reviewers improve Amazon. This outstrips OSS projects for
collaboration.

There’s so much innovation still coming up in the use of networks. Today, no-one really understands how to use a networked computer.

What keeps me up at night?

No one in OSS seems to care about Google/Amazon/eBay (I told
Bezos off for pissing in the well when he sued BN.com)

Users don’t own their data — who cares about source when your
data is locked in?

O’Reilly implies a solution for the first: Don’t abuse the excess IP protection offered by bribed legislatures, stick to open innovation. He addresses the second in more depth here.

I’d also suggest state mandated exportability of personal data from all applications, web or desktop… but I hear people don’t like that sort of thing. The market will get there alone, but being nudged toward the eventual - more open - compromise would help everyone.