nanogui: Request for comments - Microwindows
Subject:
Re: Request for comments - Microwindows
From:
Quinn D Weaver ####@####.####
Date:
4 Oct 1999 23:23:59 -0000
Message-Id: <Pine.GSO.3.96.991004181019.28742D-100000@steel3.ucs.indiana.edu>
> But you aren't anywhere near being representative of the market we wish
> to reach. In fact, until recently we didn't even consider the OEM market,
> since it is small compared to the segment we are targetting. Free software
> simply isn't an issue in our market segment - most of our potential customers
> likely haven't even heard the phrase before, and there will be lots of
> closed source software on the box - much of it from partners where we
> have no influence whatsoever on whether or not they'll open source
> their applications.
Aha. This makes things a lot clearer. I thought you were trying to
market cool more-functional-than-Palm devices to end users, mainly geeks
like me. ;) From what you've written, I infer that you are instead
addressing the market of specialized embedded and portable applications
for businesses (or rather developers for that market). Indeed, those
customers and developers are unlikely to care a fig for open source.
In that context, Screenmedia seems less like a company that serves the
Linux community directly (which is what I thought it was initially--
must be my egotism ;) ) and more like an embedded-systems company that
happens to have taken the opportunity to help out the Linux community
while getting its own job done. In that light, the need for a closed-
source-compatible license makes real sense (Screenmedia really doesn't
have any choice), and I laud you for convincing the company to go open
source in the first place, when it could have made as much money keeping
nanogui proprietary.
Thanks!
--Q
