The question for a company like TenTec is "where is their added-value".
I would think most of their added-value is in their hardware design
rather than in their software design (though as the latter is
proprietary it's more difficult to see if they're using novel
techniques and then protecting them as trade secrets in not revealing
the hardware).
If you can share non-value adding (or commodity) software and
persuade other people to contribute and maintain or even fork the
software then you can make your hardware more valuable. And improve
your customers choice and perhaps the availability of less buggy
software.
The idea that their hardware is even more valuable when the software
is open-sourced has already been seen with other products. For
example the Linksys WRT54G hardware that people buy preferentially so
they can run another software distribution (dd-wrt, sveasoft, etc)
rather than Linksys/Ciscos own software.
It also helps extend the life of products. Like my RX-320 and RX-320D
doesn't get much "love" from TT these days but I'm pretty sure that
amateurs hacking on their code would like to add more features.
Another question is how would an open source/free software approach
affect the design of their hardware. Software development for custom
embedded designs in more of a challenge than reusing commodity
hardware. Would it make more sense to use commodity miniITX x86 CPUs
rather than DSPs in future designs? Again making more of the product
from commodity parts especially as a receiver becomes more and more
like a computer with an RJ-45 on the back panel rather than a new
custom design for each major model.
Of course the idea of "the enemy" "stealing" "your" software may
still be in some peoples minds but co-operation can be more effective
than competition in some areas. Turing "my" software into "our"
software can have interesting effects on both new products and the
market.
On Jul 24, 2007, at 3:05 PM, ron wrote:
> On Tue, 2007-07-24 at 17:44 -0400, Jeremy Cowgar wrote:
>> On Tue, Jul 24, 2007 at 01:47:12PM -0700, Kevin Purcell wrote:
>>> I've wondered if TT has considered the open-source route for
>>> software
>>> development on their hardware to allow more community participation.
>>> After all do they make money on selling software or hardware?
>>
>> I've heard discussions on that in the past and I think their fear
>> (wrong
>> or right) is that they will invest the majority of the time in
>> developing the software then some other company will come along
>> and use
>> (or learn) from their code. Therefore, they are educating the enemy.
>>
>> Who knows if that would play out or not. One thing I do know is
>> that if
>> they were to do that, their radios would become a radio "platform"
>> and I
>> believe their sales would really skyrocket. Imagine having a radio
>> that
>> you can download different "Operating Systems" to and try out? That
>> would be one cool system.
>>
>
> you mean, "open source" or "GNU"?? There are codes to adhere to when
> using open source, thus no one will do as you suggested.
> Look at Linux, look at Ham Radio Deluxe, look at JLog, look at ...
> you
> get the idea. I don't think there is a "enemy", only community
> support.
>
> Ron
> "Got Linux??"
>
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--
Kevin Purcell
kevinpurcell@pobox.com
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