I had known about some licensing issues with CGIDEV2, a tool for web-enabling iSeries applications, for a while but hadn’t fully grokked the implications. This was apparently open source code… that wasn’t.
My old boss Jonathan Eunice tore IBM a new one yesterday, which reminded me of the case. It seems the blogosphere is doing its work, and IBM will almost certainly be forced to recant. The company has hard-won open source “bona fides” to protect. The commercial/open source balancing act is not an easy one, and slip ups can quickly alter market perceptions. Danger danger- high voltage.
Silicon Valley Sleuth calls IBM’s vacillation/equivocation “rape”, which is a bit strong, but such language is of course the expected standard of discourse in IT. A better reason to go check out the blog post is the excellent visual gag: scroll to the bottom of its blog entry to see the “Tux as Pinocchio” pic.
Timothy Prickett Morgan provides more context on the story here.
IBM needs to get its act together fast. As James Robertson said yesterday about Dell support issues, “either you define your message, or watch it get defined for you.”
If IBM doesn’t define the story, someone else will. That process is now in effect.
What are some additional risk factors for IBM to consider?
For one thing, the long-standing (long-suffering?) iSeries tecosystem is in a transition period. People like Nigel Fortlage really do believe in open source on iSeries. IBM needs to get over the notion it manages its customers though.
Note to STG and IBM account managers–customers manage you, they choose what products they want to acquire. Its not up to you. If customers don’t like the choices you suggest they may well look for alternatives. The quickest way to drive workloads to Intel is to try and snow these folks. Is OpenPower a business strategy or just a marketing conceit?
Migration issues are especially pressing because Microsoft is beginning to build some momentum with its midrange alliance. You know something is afoot when Microsoft.com points to a white paper series called A Plan for Making the iSeries Cool Again (that man Prickett Morgan again).
Microsoft want to “modernise iSeries”, for obvious reasons, and you can bet it won’t pull bait and switch on open source and copyright policy. Microsoft tends to be – ahem – kind of rigorous in that regard. You can bet there are some folks in Redmond now rubbing their hands at the opportunity to FUD IBM on OSS licensing compliance issues.
My advice to IBM would be establish a truly open source governance model and choose a license for CGIDEV2, then start building an ecosystem that gives customers what they want.
The business questions is straightforward- do you want to drive up iSeries workloads, or not?
If so, free up the tooling. If not, don’t worry, Microsoft will be only too happy to eat your lunch. From my perspective IBM can’t afford to screw up iSeries, even after all this time, it is still IBM’s strongest SMB beach head. IBM Express is a forward-looking statement. iSeries is a fully-fledged ecosystem. I know which one I would double down on from a tactical perspective, and that means not playing bait and switch with customers.
james governor says:
August 2, 2005 at 4:33 pm
Seems like IBM is on the case now. I recieved a clarification from an IBM spokesman within hours of posting. Here it is:
Recent reports suggest that the eServer iSeries system will no longer support CGIDEV2 code. This report was a miscommunication and IBM regrets the confusion it has caused. To address any issues customers may still have, IBM will direct customers to a different Web site (URL to be determined), from which CGIDEV2 may be downloaded. All visitors to the current Easy400 site will be redirected to the new CGIDEV2 site. CGIDEV2 enables programmers to write code for the Internet, using COBOL or RPG as CGI language, which reinvigorates legacy applications. Additionally, IBM is investigating licensing the code under an Open Source license at a later date.