Invention as a profession is dead. It should not be.
Long ago, when someone decided to become an inventor, they committed to it. Invention was a risky profession, but it also had the potential for great payoffs. Most inventions were unsuccessful. Failure was far more common than success. Some inventors had to do work on the side to fund their profession, and others had to beg family or friends for funding. The life of an inventor was filled with disappointments marked with occasional success. Inventing was not an easy life, but we are very lucky that there were people willing to do it. All of our modern technology is based on technologies and inventions created by these inventors. Sadly, modern economics and politics have killed this noble profession.
In the early U.S., inventors were willing to deal with constant failure. They would test absurd ideas, even though the chances of success were low. Economically, this was often very hard on inventors. When the occasional absurd idea was successful though, the benefits to the inventor and to society were often very large. Also, regular failure taught the inventors more about how things worked, which has benefitted society to an even larger degree. Modern science rides on the discoveries made from failed ideas.
Maybe it seems like the most successful inventors had fewer failures. This is not true. According to Edison, he tried 999 filament materials for the light bulb before he tried the carbonized bamboo that lasted long enough to be practical (it is probable that he tried even more than that). That is a success rate of 0.1%. Successful inventors have usually failed more times, but only because they have tried more things.
Modern economics have destroyed the profession of inventor, because it expects quick returns. Modern economics suggests that ideas that do not have almost guaranteed returns are not worth pursuing. It also suggests that ideas that will not turn profits in less than a few years are not profitable at all (though this does not apply to the pharmaceutical or tech industries). Politics have made the situation even worse, by allowing companies to hoard patents they never intend on using. Inventors now would have to navigate a legal minefield of patent trolls, a task which takes a degree in patent law to execute successfully. Our current legal and economic habitat is hostile to inventors.
Now, I can hear some people saying that invention is not a dead profession, but rather it has evolved. Not so! Invention is the creation of new things. Inventors create new things from new ideas. Not just this, but inventors do this as their profession. What I mean by this is, they do not occasionally invent new things when their job requires it. Inventors spend most of their working time creating or testing new ideas. When a guy at a semiconductor company comes up with a new communication technology, he is inventing, but that does not make him a professional inventor. He may spend most of his time piecing together smaller components to make a larger component that does something that has already been done. In fact, a large part of computer science and electrical engineering is not inventing, but just creating mundane solutions from existing technology. Maybe a company will create a faster microprocessor using a new manufacturing technology. The new technology is a new invention. The work going into adapting old processor technology to the new manufacturing technology is mostly just adaptation, not invention. Invention involves the creation of substantially new things. Minor improvements to a product is hardly serious inventing. Also, the number of patents a person has does not determine whether that person is an inventor or not. The guy who patented "exercising a cat" with a laser pointer is certainly no inventor. In part, because a single invention does not make a person an inventor, in part because a serious inventor may never patent anything (and inventor who always fails may still be an inventor), and in part because that particular activity was common knowledge, and thus does not even qualify as an invention. Some engineers hold thousands of patents or more, but this still does not make them inventors. Are the patents for real innovations, or are they for processes or products that are less than novel ways of doing things that are only marginally different from existing ideas? Microsoft holds (or held, last I heard) a patent for a progress bar on mobile platforms. This is hardly novel, and in fact, even in the infancy of computing, a graphical progress bar was not novel. Such constructs have been used in writing for tracking time passed for centuries (tally marks are a form of visual progress indicator, very similar to the progress bar). Serious inventors do not just take existing ideas and make minor improvements or alterations. Serious inventors invent completely new things. The first music player was a serious invention. The MP3 player was a less serious invention, because it was just a more compact and convenient music player. It did not really do anything that had not been done before. It just did the same things a little differently (how it does it is different; what it does is not). The first blue MP3 player created was not really an invention at all, because it did exactly the same thing as other MP3 players, but with a blue color. It did nothing differently; it only looked slightly different. Professional inventors do not just change the color or make trivial changes. In fact, people who make trivial changes to improve a product are often referred to as "hackers." Hackers make small improvements to existing technologies or products. Inventors create entirely new technologies or products.
Why should the profession of invention not be dead? Inventing improves technology, science, and society faster than the incremental innovation that is common now. Modern companies invent only so much as is necessary to keep an edge over competitors, and they invent in as small of steps as possible to minimize risk of failure. This is a very slow way of advancing technology. It also minimizes the chances of discovering wildly new technologies that could revolutionize civilization. It prevents or delays the successes that could be the most beneficial to society, civilization, and technology. It retards technological advancement.
Can invention as a profession be revived? I believe it can. In fact, I believe it has almost everything going for it. Back in the day of Edison, obtaining materials for inventing could be expensive and difficult. I have been told that he once tried a special grass from Africa (I think), as a filament for the light bulb. The first shipment rotted in transit, so he paid for a second one. If he had not already gotten fairly wealthy from some of his other inventions, he would never have been able to try this (and, he would not have been able to afford the bamboo fiber that he finally settled on). Now, almost anything can be obtained fairly cheaply on Amazon or EBay. Most of the highly specialized inventing tools of the past can be obtained for free as software if you have a computer. Math that was extremely advanced can now be abstracted away with free simulation software. Prototyping has become very cheap with the wide availability of 3D printing. In fact, a cheap 3D printer can be constructed for home use for only a few hundred dollars. Perhaps the most dramatic improvement is welfare. Back in the early U.S., inventors often risked their own welfare as well as that of their family. Too many failed inventions could result in starvation or loss of property. The economics of inventing could be like some sort of tightrope act. Too much money spent on inventing could result in starvation, but too little could limit the potential for success, also ending in starvation. Now, we have a half decent government welfare system that can function as a safety net. The modern inventor no longer has to worry so much about starvation and homelessness. Failure will still occur, but that will never change. The true secret to success is to fail often, because failure teaches, and the more often you try, the higher your chances of success over time. The inventor who tries 10 things a month has far fewer chances to succeed than the inventor who tries 100 things a month.
This situation can and should be improved further. Unemployment is still very high. The problem is no longer so much lack of jobs as it is lack of work. We can produce everything we need and much of what we want with much less labor than is available. This is not necessarily a bad thing, if we can find a beneficial way to use the excess labor. There are several ways to do this. The first is crowdfunding. Kickstarter provides a very good service for helping to fund projects that are very well thought out and planned. It does not do so well for larger, longer term research projects. Invention often involves trying many ideas without a good idea of what will be the most likely road to success. Kickstarter projects must have some kind of schedule (at least a tentative one), with a well defined definition of success. Serious invention projects do not always have schedules, because there is not enough data to estimate how long things will take. I imagine Edison expected to find an acceptable filament material for his light bulb in only a few hundred tries. Instead it took at least 1,000 tries. By Kickstarter standards, this would be a failure, but in reality, it was a very significant success. Now, I am not trying to bash Kickstarter. I think it is great, and the limitations are useful in defining and limiting the risk. I do, however, think we need more crowdfunding systems for more risky projects. Kickstarter is great because it only offers projects that are lower risk and that guarantee some kind of return. This attracts a certain kind of investor. More serious invention projects would likely attract fewer investors, and they would be funded less often. There might be little guarantee of return, but investors will be aware of this up front. One great idea I would like to see is an open source crowdfunding operation where the main requirement is that all research notes and discoveries be released under open source hardware or software licences. One of the best things about this kind of system is that the researchers would get paid reasonably for their work, and the results become available to the investors with no strings attached (even if they fail).
Another option is government incentives. Government incentives might include stipends for people who can prove they are spending significant time inventing or learning things useful for inventing. Inventors might also get tax credits for money spent on tools and resources used for inventing. People who spend more than 10 hours a week inventing might even be able to request invention grants, to help pay for more expensive tools or resources. This would help reduce the unemployment problem and for those who are worried about anyone getting a free lunch, there could be some kind of requirement that the results of any useful inventions become public domain in a shorter time than the normal patent term. Not only would this help alleviate unemployment by consuming excess labor, it would also give unemployed people more useful things to do than searching for jobs that do not exist, and it would help improve the rate of technology progression in the U.S. (which we sorely need). Also, it would further reduce the risk of inventing.
High risk inventing is what drives serious technological advancement. There is evidence of this in the fact that Japan used to be technologically very inferior to the U.S., but is now rather far ahead. China is beginning to catch up as well. People in Japan and China fear failure less than people in the U.S. Japan has had many failed inventions, but there are some that have been successful against all odds. There are some pretty absurd inventions that have been successful in Japan (for instance, a bidet with a massaging sprayer like those found in many shower heads). China is catching up, because many Chinese people have less to lose, so they are willing to take larger risks (it also helps that labor is cheaper than is ethical there; note that I am not endorsing this). In the U.S., we do not see absurd inventions, because no one bothers even trying to invent something that sounds absurd, because we fear failure. We have a safety net, so we have no excuse anymore. If an American tries to invent something and fails, or if it takes longer than expected, there is a welfare system to make up the slack. Yes, it should be even better than this, but we have it far better than those early Americans who took great risks in inventing the technology that has brought us so far. It would be a shame to abandon the profession that got us to where we are now, just because we are afraid we might fail.
Showing posts with label open source. Show all posts
Showing posts with label open source. Show all posts
05 May 2014
31 March 2009
Conversion to Open Source Software: Training
If you are running a business and want to cut costs, one of the easiest and simplest things you can do is switch to open source software. Generally, this involves finding and downloading open source equivalents of any proprietary software you currently use, evaluating that software, and then installing the software and converting document formats to fit that software company wide. This may also require some amount of training employees to use the new software. That is what this article is about, the training.
Let's begin with OpenOffice.org, probably the most popular open source alternative to MS Office. The conversion here is simple. First let me ask a question: Has your company switched to MS Office 2007 yet? If you answered "yes", then training for OpenOffice.org is almost entirely unnecessary.
Earlier today, my mother was complaining about how much more difficult it is to use MS Office 2007 in comparison to earlier versions. People in your company probably make similar complaints, although maybe not in front of you. My solution was to install OpenOffice.org on her computer. No additional training was required, because OpenOffice.org is so similar to earlier versions of MS Office, that anyone who has just switched to MS Office 2007 will be completely willing to work out the few differences just to have something they already know how to use.
If that does not work, open Firefox to Google (I presume your company had the sense to switch to Firefox when the Department of Homeland Security declared MS Internet Explorer a security hazard) and search "OpenOffice.org tutorial". The first item in the results looks pretty good. If you do not like that one, the next few look pretty good as well. The point is that even if most of your employees do not want to read a tutorial, there are plenty out there and if you just have one employee read one or two of them, at least that employee can help out the others if they have issues.
If you are still skeptical, take a look at this link. How did I find this? Simple: I went to amazon.com and I entered "OpenOffice.org" into the search. That link was the first result. If you do not like that author, or how the book looks, there was a list with many other similar books. Even if you take the tutorial route one of these might be handy to have around for reference.
OpenOffice.org is a very popular piece of open source software and as such has a reasonable footprint. By this I mean that OpenOffice.org has managed to get enough attention for people to actually write and publish books detailing how to use it. This is not true of all open source software. One thing you need to learn before switching to open source software is how to find information about that software. In the previous paragraphs, I used two of the most effective methods for finding this information. If you need to learn anything on the internet, one of the most effective ways of finding teaching oriented information is using the keyword "tutorial" in a search. I searched "electronics tutorial" to begin learning basic electrical engineering. I have used "javascript tutorial" to learn javascript. This works with almost anything, but especially with software.
As you may have already figured out, the second most effective way of finding information online is by searching the subject you want to learn about, ie. "OpenOffice.org". In the above case, I wanted to find books related to the subject, so I went to one of the foremost online bookstores and searched. If you have tried it, you have seen the long list of relevant information. While these are probably the fastest and most effective way of finding information about using open source software, there are a few more which should be obvious, but are not always.
I think I am safe saying that all open source software projects have their own web page, in one form or another. Many smaller ones use repositories like sourceforge.net (write this down, this website has a very large number of open source projects, and a simple search will often leave you with many useful results), but each one still has its own pages on the web site. Bigger projects, like OpenOffice.org have full web sites all to themselves. OpenOffice.org's web page can be found at openoffice.org (big surprise?). As a matter of fact, let's go there right now. Notice on the left hand side (or maybe the middle of the page for you) there is a list of options? The top one and the third one down offer support of different types. Near the top of the page, there is a row of tabs; notice how the title of the fourth tab is "support". Click that. If you are familiar with internet forums, you might recognize the format of this page. This is a place where you can ask questions about OpenOffice.org, and people will answer them. The answers do not always appear overnight, but unless they are rediculous or unrelated to OpenOffice.org, they will probably be answered relativly quickly. If you are switching your business to OpenOffice.org and your staff is worried about learning to use it, show them that site. Make sure they know that answers often will not be immediate, but they will eventually come. Many open source software websites actually include tutorials made by the people who made the program. These websites can be invaluable sources of information and should probably be your first stop when looking for learning resources for open source software.
That should cover training for open source software. Try these techniques if you are hesitant about switching to open source software because of training issues. Another good idea is to download the software yourself and play around with it. Many open source applications are relatively self explanitory. I learned to use OpenOffice.org by using it. Your experience with proprietary software may also help you with open source software. I took a MS Office 2007 class and learned how to use OpenOffice.org's spreadsheet program more effectively, because a lot of the information applied directly to how OpenOffice.org operates. Remember though that not everyone learns like I do, or like you do. It is wise to supply your staff with reference materials, so they do not have to keep knocking on your door to ask how to do things that they were not able to figure out on their own.
In parting, I would like to offer some useful links:
Open Disc is a project that has compiled a CD of useful open source software for Windows.
Open Education Disc is a branch of the Open Disc project tailored towards students, especially college students, but contains some software that could be useful within selected business environments.
SourceForge.net was already mentioned in the article, but bears repeating. This website hosts web space for an enourmous number of open source projects. It is more frequently used by smaller projects, but it does host many larger projects as well.
Wikipedia.com has lists of open source software, if you look in the right places. An example is a search for "accounting software". At the bottom of the wikipedia page, in the 'references' section, there are lists of open source, freeware, and 'retail' (or, rather, proprietary) accounting applications. Similar searches for other types of software should yield similar results.
Searching "open source" or "open source software" on modern search engines will also get a long list of open source software sources. Just be careful. Upon searching "open source office" I discovered that there are web sites out there that try to exploit open source software by asking for personal information before allowing you to download it. Most good open source software is freely downloadable. Free as in no strings attached, so if you discover that the first site listed for the above search asks for your email address (and various other information) before it will allow you to download OpenOffice.org, note that it was a 'sponsered link' (ie, the web site payed Google to put it at the top), and note that the link under it, to OpenOffice.org is not a sponsered link and does not ask for anything before allowing you to download OpenOffice.org.
Lord Rybec
Let's begin with OpenOffice.org, probably the most popular open source alternative to MS Office. The conversion here is simple. First let me ask a question: Has your company switched to MS Office 2007 yet? If you answered "yes", then training for OpenOffice.org is almost entirely unnecessary.
Earlier today, my mother was complaining about how much more difficult it is to use MS Office 2007 in comparison to earlier versions. People in your company probably make similar complaints, although maybe not in front of you. My solution was to install OpenOffice.org on her computer. No additional training was required, because OpenOffice.org is so similar to earlier versions of MS Office, that anyone who has just switched to MS Office 2007 will be completely willing to work out the few differences just to have something they already know how to use.
If that does not work, open Firefox to Google (I presume your company had the sense to switch to Firefox when the Department of Homeland Security declared MS Internet Explorer a security hazard) and search "OpenOffice.org tutorial". The first item in the results looks pretty good. If you do not like that one, the next few look pretty good as well. The point is that even if most of your employees do not want to read a tutorial, there are plenty out there and if you just have one employee read one or two of them, at least that employee can help out the others if they have issues.
If you are still skeptical, take a look at this link. How did I find this? Simple: I went to amazon.com and I entered "OpenOffice.org" into the search. That link was the first result. If you do not like that author, or how the book looks, there was a list with many other similar books. Even if you take the tutorial route one of these might be handy to have around for reference.
OpenOffice.org is a very popular piece of open source software and as such has a reasonable footprint. By this I mean that OpenOffice.org has managed to get enough attention for people to actually write and publish books detailing how to use it. This is not true of all open source software. One thing you need to learn before switching to open source software is how to find information about that software. In the previous paragraphs, I used two of the most effective methods for finding this information. If you need to learn anything on the internet, one of the most effective ways of finding teaching oriented information is using the keyword "tutorial" in a search. I searched "electronics tutorial" to begin learning basic electrical engineering. I have used "javascript tutorial" to learn javascript. This works with almost anything, but especially with software.
As you may have already figured out, the second most effective way of finding information online is by searching the subject you want to learn about, ie. "OpenOffice.org". In the above case, I wanted to find books related to the subject, so I went to one of the foremost online bookstores and searched. If you have tried it, you have seen the long list of relevant information. While these are probably the fastest and most effective way of finding information about using open source software, there are a few more which should be obvious, but are not always.
I think I am safe saying that all open source software projects have their own web page, in one form or another. Many smaller ones use repositories like sourceforge.net (write this down, this website has a very large number of open source projects, and a simple search will often leave you with many useful results), but each one still has its own pages on the web site. Bigger projects, like OpenOffice.org have full web sites all to themselves. OpenOffice.org's web page can be found at openoffice.org (big surprise?). As a matter of fact, let's go there right now. Notice on the left hand side (or maybe the middle of the page for you) there is a list of options? The top one and the third one down offer support of different types. Near the top of the page, there is a row of tabs; notice how the title of the fourth tab is "support". Click that. If you are familiar with internet forums, you might recognize the format of this page. This is a place where you can ask questions about OpenOffice.org, and people will answer them. The answers do not always appear overnight, but unless they are rediculous or unrelated to OpenOffice.org, they will probably be answered relativly quickly. If you are switching your business to OpenOffice.org and your staff is worried about learning to use it, show them that site. Make sure they know that answers often will not be immediate, but they will eventually come. Many open source software websites actually include tutorials made by the people who made the program. These websites can be invaluable sources of information and should probably be your first stop when looking for learning resources for open source software.
That should cover training for open source software. Try these techniques if you are hesitant about switching to open source software because of training issues. Another good idea is to download the software yourself and play around with it. Many open source applications are relatively self explanitory. I learned to use OpenOffice.org by using it. Your experience with proprietary software may also help you with open source software. I took a MS Office 2007 class and learned how to use OpenOffice.org's spreadsheet program more effectively, because a lot of the information applied directly to how OpenOffice.org operates. Remember though that not everyone learns like I do, or like you do. It is wise to supply your staff with reference materials, so they do not have to keep knocking on your door to ask how to do things that they were not able to figure out on their own.
In parting, I would like to offer some useful links:
Open Disc is a project that has compiled a CD of useful open source software for Windows.
Open Education Disc is a branch of the Open Disc project tailored towards students, especially college students, but contains some software that could be useful within selected business environments.
SourceForge.net was already mentioned in the article, but bears repeating. This website hosts web space for an enourmous number of open source projects. It is more frequently used by smaller projects, but it does host many larger projects as well.
Wikipedia.com has lists of open source software, if you look in the right places. An example is a search for "accounting software". At the bottom of the wikipedia page, in the 'references' section, there are lists of open source, freeware, and 'retail' (or, rather, proprietary) accounting applications. Similar searches for other types of software should yield similar results.
Searching "open source" or "open source software" on modern search engines will also get a long list of open source software sources. Just be careful. Upon searching "open source office" I discovered that there are web sites out there that try to exploit open source software by asking for personal information before allowing you to download it. Most good open source software is freely downloadable. Free as in no strings attached, so if you discover that the first site listed for the above search asks for your email address (and various other information) before it will allow you to download OpenOffice.org, note that it was a 'sponsered link' (ie, the web site payed Google to put it at the top), and note that the link under it, to OpenOffice.org is not a sponsered link and does not ask for anything before allowing you to download OpenOffice.org.
Lord Rybec
16 March 2009
Cutting Costs
You may have noticed that the U.S. economy is having major problems right now. You may also have noticed that most of our economy experts are at a loss as to why we are having these problems. You may also have noticed that the answer is obvious. Anyhow, that is not what this article is about. This article is about cutting costs in business and government, in an effort to survive the current economical problems.
Businesses and government should always be keeping an eye open for new ways of saving money. If this advice had been followed over the last two decades, we might not be having these problems with our economy. The problem is that most businesses only take advantage of the cost cutting techniques that hit them in the face. I would like to propose that businesses and government agencies should have small departments dedicated to research and development of cost management. If the right people were hired for the job far more money could be saved than it would take to fund the department. I have some suggestions on how this should be handled.
The first thing to consider with cost management is where money is being spent. Retailers probably already have someone who negotiates prices with wholesalers. The new department might be a good place for this person.
The next thing to consider is operating costs that don't result in direct income. Supplies like toilet paper, paper hand towels, cleaning supplies, receipt paper, and office supplies are among these. At my job, our store has changed the style of paper hand towels we put in the bathrooms three times. Each time the claim has been that the new method will save money. The funny thing is that we are now back to the ones we started with, but we had to replace the dispensers each time, so ultimately, even if each change saved money on towels, we incurred extra costs on the dispensers. If I was to make a guess, I would say that we are probably not the only store in the corporation that has done this and I would also guess that there are currently other stores using the less cost effective route. It may be that costs differ between regions because of shipping costs or other variables, but if we had a person calculating these costs, there is a very good potential that we could save enough to pay this person's salary, as well as save additional money. The person in this position would probably be in charge of bathroom supplies, cleaning supplies, and office supplies.
The next area is IT. Technology is an area where most businesses are either willing to spill money into it like a black hole, or they go as cheap as they possibly can. Neither of these are cost effective methods of running a business or government agency. Companies that go cheap on technology generally suffer for it (although, since they have never had sufficient technology to begin with, they usually do not even realize it). On the other hand, it is pretty obvious to most people that businesses that pour money into technology suffer from lack of funds elsewhere. Businesses and government agencies need technology workers who have an understanding of what the organization needs. The problem here is that many IT professionals do not want to cut costs; they want the business to have cutting edge technology. Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting the cutting edge for your home, but you do not need a gaming computer for running the business's accounting software.
What businesses need to look for is IT people who understand what the business needs and what it does not need. An important thing to look at when hiring an IT worker for this type of position is someone who has a good knowledge of all current technology. A good test for this is another article I wrote: Open Source Software in Business and Government If your candidate reads this article and is surprised to learn the things it discusses, they are definitely not the person for the job. The article outlines many ways an organization can save money on software licensing costs. The information therein is widely available for anyone with access to the internet. If your candidate has not been able to discover this information on their own, do not expect them to suddenly become good at finding other cost management information just because you hired them to do it. You may actually be better off finding someone without certifications or degrees, if they have the ability to find information like this. A good person for the job might be someone who has never bought a new computer in their life, but is able to do everything they need with the computers they have. These people have probably used their cost management abilities to obtain computers that are sufficient for thier needs at the lowest possible cost. This kind of candidate would be ideal for an IT cost management position.
The most expensive things most businesses buy are computers and software. Some businesses have managed to cut costs by using free software alternatives (see the article mentioned in the previous paragraph). One of these businesses is Lowe's. Lowe's uses the Linux operating system for their POS system, as well as most of their order management system. Even a small proprietary alternative would cost at least $50 per computer and Lowe's has at least 30 computers per store. That is a savings of at least $1,500 per store. For a large corporation, that does not seem like much, but if Lowe's has 200 stores (I believe it has more), that adds up to $300,000. Not only that, but eventually computers must be replaced and each replacement would cost another $50 for licensing costs for the software.
Since my other article covers software very well, we are going to discuss hardware. Businesses often discover that they can save money by making contracts for hardware, like computers. The problem with this is that frequently businesses and government agencies accept poor contracts because they believe that because it is a bulk contract, it must be a good deal, and no one wants to take the time (or has the knowledge) to shop around. Often this results in expensive long-term obligations. In additon, many companies that sell preconstructed computers use low quality products that will not last very long. Good warranties and service plans can circumvent some of the costs associated with these problems, but you should also consider downtime for broken hardware. This is an area where a good IT cost management employee is valuable. Many IT professionals might recommend that you sign a contract with a company like Dell, or Gateway. In some cases this might be cost efficient, but many times a good IT expert (with some cost management skill) can find a better deal than that and in addition, they may be able to arrange it without a long term contract that may become oppressive in the future. (Consider a contract that has you paying $1,200 each for a computer that was good 5 years ago, when you signed the contract.) This is not work that a normal IT graduate has been trained in, so businesses should take care when looking for people for this sort of position.
There are many ways businesses and government can save money, but lack of technical knowledge, lack of time, or just plain laziness often get in the way of this. If no one is willing or able to do this kind of work, businesses and government agencies should consider hiring people to do it. Even if your business is not struggling, it is a good idea to consider this, because someday it may make the difference between business as usual and going under. Most government agencies are already underfunded, so they have no excuse for failing to find ways of stretching our tax dollars. In some cases, businesses may not benefit from this sort of program, but since most businesses will benefit from it, it is worth the risk to invest in better cost management.
Lord Rybec
Businesses and government should always be keeping an eye open for new ways of saving money. If this advice had been followed over the last two decades, we might not be having these problems with our economy. The problem is that most businesses only take advantage of the cost cutting techniques that hit them in the face. I would like to propose that businesses and government agencies should have small departments dedicated to research and development of cost management. If the right people were hired for the job far more money could be saved than it would take to fund the department. I have some suggestions on how this should be handled.
The first thing to consider with cost management is where money is being spent. Retailers probably already have someone who negotiates prices with wholesalers. The new department might be a good place for this person.
The next thing to consider is operating costs that don't result in direct income. Supplies like toilet paper, paper hand towels, cleaning supplies, receipt paper, and office supplies are among these. At my job, our store has changed the style of paper hand towels we put in the bathrooms three times. Each time the claim has been that the new method will save money. The funny thing is that we are now back to the ones we started with, but we had to replace the dispensers each time, so ultimately, even if each change saved money on towels, we incurred extra costs on the dispensers. If I was to make a guess, I would say that we are probably not the only store in the corporation that has done this and I would also guess that there are currently other stores using the less cost effective route. It may be that costs differ between regions because of shipping costs or other variables, but if we had a person calculating these costs, there is a very good potential that we could save enough to pay this person's salary, as well as save additional money. The person in this position would probably be in charge of bathroom supplies, cleaning supplies, and office supplies.
The next area is IT. Technology is an area where most businesses are either willing to spill money into it like a black hole, or they go as cheap as they possibly can. Neither of these are cost effective methods of running a business or government agency. Companies that go cheap on technology generally suffer for it (although, since they have never had sufficient technology to begin with, they usually do not even realize it). On the other hand, it is pretty obvious to most people that businesses that pour money into technology suffer from lack of funds elsewhere. Businesses and government agencies need technology workers who have an understanding of what the organization needs. The problem here is that many IT professionals do not want to cut costs; they want the business to have cutting edge technology. Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting the cutting edge for your home, but you do not need a gaming computer for running the business's accounting software.
What businesses need to look for is IT people who understand what the business needs and what it does not need. An important thing to look at when hiring an IT worker for this type of position is someone who has a good knowledge of all current technology. A good test for this is another article I wrote: Open Source Software in Business and Government If your candidate reads this article and is surprised to learn the things it discusses, they are definitely not the person for the job. The article outlines many ways an organization can save money on software licensing costs. The information therein is widely available for anyone with access to the internet. If your candidate has not been able to discover this information on their own, do not expect them to suddenly become good at finding other cost management information just because you hired them to do it. You may actually be better off finding someone without certifications or degrees, if they have the ability to find information like this. A good person for the job might be someone who has never bought a new computer in their life, but is able to do everything they need with the computers they have. These people have probably used their cost management abilities to obtain computers that are sufficient for thier needs at the lowest possible cost. This kind of candidate would be ideal for an IT cost management position.
The most expensive things most businesses buy are computers and software. Some businesses have managed to cut costs by using free software alternatives (see the article mentioned in the previous paragraph). One of these businesses is Lowe's. Lowe's uses the Linux operating system for their POS system, as well as most of their order management system. Even a small proprietary alternative would cost at least $50 per computer and Lowe's has at least 30 computers per store. That is a savings of at least $1,500 per store. For a large corporation, that does not seem like much, but if Lowe's has 200 stores (I believe it has more), that adds up to $300,000. Not only that, but eventually computers must be replaced and each replacement would cost another $50 for licensing costs for the software.
Since my other article covers software very well, we are going to discuss hardware. Businesses often discover that they can save money by making contracts for hardware, like computers. The problem with this is that frequently businesses and government agencies accept poor contracts because they believe that because it is a bulk contract, it must be a good deal, and no one wants to take the time (or has the knowledge) to shop around. Often this results in expensive long-term obligations. In additon, many companies that sell preconstructed computers use low quality products that will not last very long. Good warranties and service plans can circumvent some of the costs associated with these problems, but you should also consider downtime for broken hardware. This is an area where a good IT cost management employee is valuable. Many IT professionals might recommend that you sign a contract with a company like Dell, or Gateway. In some cases this might be cost efficient, but many times a good IT expert (with some cost management skill) can find a better deal than that and in addition, they may be able to arrange it without a long term contract that may become oppressive in the future. (Consider a contract that has you paying $1,200 each for a computer that was good 5 years ago, when you signed the contract.) This is not work that a normal IT graduate has been trained in, so businesses should take care when looking for people for this sort of position.
There are many ways businesses and government can save money, but lack of technical knowledge, lack of time, or just plain laziness often get in the way of this. If no one is willing or able to do this kind of work, businesses and government agencies should consider hiring people to do it. Even if your business is not struggling, it is a good idea to consider this, because someday it may make the difference between business as usual and going under. Most government agencies are already underfunded, so they have no excuse for failing to find ways of stretching our tax dollars. In some cases, businesses may not benefit from this sort of program, but since most businesses will benefit from it, it is worth the risk to invest in better cost management.
Lord Rybec
13 March 2009
Open Source Software in Business and Government
I have read some emails sent between government workers recently and have been lead to the conclusion that we need a higher degree of awareness of open source software alternatives in government agencies and businesses.
Many, upon hearing about open source software make comments about how nothing is free, or how software made by people in their spare time cannot be as good as software made by companies that dedicate all of their resources to making good software. First, while everything good requires work from someone, people often choose to give service at no charge. Consider charities for a good example of this. Open source software is like a charity, only better, since the work of one person can benefit everyone willing to take advantage of it. Second, most software companies have a limited amount of personnel to program and test software, while open source software can be programmed, tested, and reviewed by anyone with a decent computer.
One thing people do not realize about software companies is that their goal is not to make good high quality software; their goal is to make as much profit as possible (they are legally required to maximize profits for their shareholders). This means making software that is just sufficient to make people willing to buy it at the price being charged. This means that a bug that will not effect most users will probably be ignored unless it is really easy to fix. This also means there will only be enough features to make it sufficiently more useful (or flashy) to make consumers want it over competitors software.
Another major problem with proprietary software in government is that software companies usually use proprietary formats for saving data, so that customers will be forced to continue to use their software instead of switching to a competitor's product. The problem with this in government (as noted in several of the emails) is that most government data is legally required to be retained in a publicly readable form, permanently. This means that if I do not own the proprietary software used to record the data, it is not readable to me, a member of the public. In addition, if future versions of the software remove support for that specific proprietary format (this is a very common technique used to force consumers to upgrade to a newer version), and old versions are no longer licensable (ie, the company stops selling the older version), the data is no longer readable by anyone who did not buy the software when it was on the market. Essentially this means that it is actually technically illegal for government organizations to store any data solely in proprietary formats, because the data cannot be considered permanently available to the public.
Businesses should also consider this. Once again, there are records that businesses are required to keep that must be in a presentable form for government inspections or audits. If the business changes its software to something that does not support the old software's format, the business could be in deep legal trouble if they get audited. The government officials do not care if the company changed its software, they want to see the records and if the company cannot produce them in a format that is readable, the company is going to get fined, or worse.
Using open source data formats can alleviate these problems. Among other things, most open source software still supports the original data formats it originally used, even if it normally uses a newer format now. Besides that, if your records are stored in an open format, even if the software that can open it no longer exists, you can find the original formating information and construct a simple program to display the data or convert it to a newer format.
These are the purely technical reasons for using open source software as opposed to proprietary software. Following are some less technical, but just as important reasons for using open source software.
Earlier I debunked the myth that software companies have more reasons and resources for making high quality software. Here you will find why open source software is often considered much better than proprietary software. Most people that are working on open source software are not getting paid for it (some companies do pay some of their programmers to help work on specific open source projects). This means that their incentive for making the software is not to earn a paycheck. Most people working on open source software are doing it because they intend on using the software and they have a specific interest in its functionality. This means that they actually want the software to work properly. If you research open source software you will find many projects that claim they are not suitable for commercial use at this point. If you use these programs you may also find that they work as well or better than many programs sold by software companies as commercial products for commercial use. The reason open source software is often superior to proprietary software is specifically that those making it aren't being paid to make it. Also, as I mentioned earlier, since anyone with a decent computer can test it, bugs are weeded out much more quickly and efficiently, and frequently new features are added as suggested by those using the software (or even added by those using the software).
Finally, one of the best reasons to seriously consider using open source software in government and business is that it is usually free. Anything that can replace a high cost commodity in government or business at no cost should be seriously considered. I have seen arguments over availability of documentation, training, tech support, and other things as reasons for avoiding open source software, but a few Google searches will quickly reveal that the community of open source software users are far more friendly for sharing information than anyone using proprietary software. Some open source software may not include as good documentation as some proprietary software, but free technical support is far more available on the internet for open source software (and you don't have to spend hours on hold waiting to talk to some guy in India who doesn't even understand english).
Switching to open source software can save large organizations enormous amounts of money. The last time I checked, Microsoft Office cost $160, if you have to buy Office for 200 computers (not unusual for large companies), that is costing you $32,000. This is just one piece of software. Adobe Photoshop CS4 costs almost $700, Adobe Illustrator CS4 costs over $300, and Adobe InDesign cost from $250 to $300. A graphic design studio could save $1,250 or more per computer using The GIMP, Inkscape, and Scribus, free open source alternatives to the proprietary programs I have mentioned above. Businesses may be able to negotiate lower prices for buying in bulk, but they can't beat free.
I would like to recommend government agencies and businesses to look for open source alternatives to the software they buy large amounts of, or pay large amounts for. If you find alternatives that appear to have any potential, download them and evaluate them. The only costs incured for evaluation are man hours, and with the potential savings, it is well worth the time spent. Just don't forget that any new software is going to have a learning curve. Remember this if, after five minutes, you decide that the software is difficult to use. If it was really that hard to use, would there be enough interest in it for it to be worth the work people are putting into it? Give your evaluators a little time to learn to use the software, then watch them use it and decide if your proprietary software is really worth the licensing costs.
Lord Rybec
Many, upon hearing about open source software make comments about how nothing is free, or how software made by people in their spare time cannot be as good as software made by companies that dedicate all of their resources to making good software. First, while everything good requires work from someone, people often choose to give service at no charge. Consider charities for a good example of this. Open source software is like a charity, only better, since the work of one person can benefit everyone willing to take advantage of it. Second, most software companies have a limited amount of personnel to program and test software, while open source software can be programmed, tested, and reviewed by anyone with a decent computer.
One thing people do not realize about software companies is that their goal is not to make good high quality software; their goal is to make as much profit as possible (they are legally required to maximize profits for their shareholders). This means making software that is just sufficient to make people willing to buy it at the price being charged. This means that a bug that will not effect most users will probably be ignored unless it is really easy to fix. This also means there will only be enough features to make it sufficiently more useful (or flashy) to make consumers want it over competitors software.
Another major problem with proprietary software in government is that software companies usually use proprietary formats for saving data, so that customers will be forced to continue to use their software instead of switching to a competitor's product. The problem with this in government (as noted in several of the emails) is that most government data is legally required to be retained in a publicly readable form, permanently. This means that if I do not own the proprietary software used to record the data, it is not readable to me, a member of the public. In addition, if future versions of the software remove support for that specific proprietary format (this is a very common technique used to force consumers to upgrade to a newer version), and old versions are no longer licensable (ie, the company stops selling the older version), the data is no longer readable by anyone who did not buy the software when it was on the market. Essentially this means that it is actually technically illegal for government organizations to store any data solely in proprietary formats, because the data cannot be considered permanently available to the public.
Businesses should also consider this. Once again, there are records that businesses are required to keep that must be in a presentable form for government inspections or audits. If the business changes its software to something that does not support the old software's format, the business could be in deep legal trouble if they get audited. The government officials do not care if the company changed its software, they want to see the records and if the company cannot produce them in a format that is readable, the company is going to get fined, or worse.
Using open source data formats can alleviate these problems. Among other things, most open source software still supports the original data formats it originally used, even if it normally uses a newer format now. Besides that, if your records are stored in an open format, even if the software that can open it no longer exists, you can find the original formating information and construct a simple program to display the data or convert it to a newer format.
These are the purely technical reasons for using open source software as opposed to proprietary software. Following are some less technical, but just as important reasons for using open source software.
Earlier I debunked the myth that software companies have more reasons and resources for making high quality software. Here you will find why open source software is often considered much better than proprietary software. Most people that are working on open source software are not getting paid for it (some companies do pay some of their programmers to help work on specific open source projects). This means that their incentive for making the software is not to earn a paycheck. Most people working on open source software are doing it because they intend on using the software and they have a specific interest in its functionality. This means that they actually want the software to work properly. If you research open source software you will find many projects that claim they are not suitable for commercial use at this point. If you use these programs you may also find that they work as well or better than many programs sold by software companies as commercial products for commercial use. The reason open source software is often superior to proprietary software is specifically that those making it aren't being paid to make it. Also, as I mentioned earlier, since anyone with a decent computer can test it, bugs are weeded out much more quickly and efficiently, and frequently new features are added as suggested by those using the software (or even added by those using the software).
Finally, one of the best reasons to seriously consider using open source software in government and business is that it is usually free. Anything that can replace a high cost commodity in government or business at no cost should be seriously considered. I have seen arguments over availability of documentation, training, tech support, and other things as reasons for avoiding open source software, but a few Google searches will quickly reveal that the community of open source software users are far more friendly for sharing information than anyone using proprietary software. Some open source software may not include as good documentation as some proprietary software, but free technical support is far more available on the internet for open source software (and you don't have to spend hours on hold waiting to talk to some guy in India who doesn't even understand english).
Switching to open source software can save large organizations enormous amounts of money. The last time I checked, Microsoft Office cost $160, if you have to buy Office for 200 computers (not unusual for large companies), that is costing you $32,000. This is just one piece of software. Adobe Photoshop CS4 costs almost $700, Adobe Illustrator CS4 costs over $300, and Adobe InDesign cost from $250 to $300. A graphic design studio could save $1,250 or more per computer using The GIMP, Inkscape, and Scribus, free open source alternatives to the proprietary programs I have mentioned above. Businesses may be able to negotiate lower prices for buying in bulk, but they can't beat free.
I would like to recommend government agencies and businesses to look for open source alternatives to the software they buy large amounts of, or pay large amounts for. If you find alternatives that appear to have any potential, download them and evaluate them. The only costs incured for evaluation are man hours, and with the potential savings, it is well worth the time spent. Just don't forget that any new software is going to have a learning curve. Remember this if, after five minutes, you decide that the software is difficult to use. If it was really that hard to use, would there be enough interest in it for it to be worth the work people are putting into it? Give your evaluators a little time to learn to use the software, then watch them use it and decide if your proprietary software is really worth the licensing costs.
Lord Rybec
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)