Why Users Drop Open Source Apps For Proprietary Alternatives

maximus1 writes "Hard as it may be to imagine, 'free' is not always the primary selling point to open source software. This article makes some interesting points about subtle ways Open Source projects might lose to the competition. Lack of features is a common answer you'd expect, but the author points out that complicated setup and configuration can be a real turn-off. Moreover, open source companies may not do enough to market major upgrades. If they did, they might lure back folks who tried and dumped the earlier, less polished version. This raises the question: what made you dump an open source app you were using? What could that project have done differently?"

Open Source Browsers RIP?

[aoheno]

Chrome is also open source so by this logic it will very likely suffer the same fate and be dumped. Rather than go back to IE I have decided to retire.

Re:Spot On!

[Joebert]

Mod parent down as offtopic, and then mod this up as funny, so that people with re-parented replies see it attached to something completely unrelated and have their heads explode trying to figure out why on earth they should mod down a perfectly good post !

Re:Why surprising?

[Fred_A]

Hard as it may be to imagine, 'free' is not always the primary selling point to open source software.

Why is it hard to imagine? People will pay money for something if it saves them time, or is simply more pleasant to use. It's software after all - free isn't the best drawcard if the software is crap to begin with, and goodness-knows there's a ton of crap open source software out there.

I've always thought that the "monetary free" had to be pretty close to the bottom of the list for most corporate decision makers when considering open source. Or at least quite far from the primary selling point. Freedom could be a good argument. Cost ? Not really. (except as in "but if it's free then who is going to invite me for lunch ?")

Re:Stability

[CarpetShark]

What!? Cinelerra is the least stable program

You're using the old definition of Stable. Stable v1.1beta is so much better. Please upgrade; we're no longer accepting bug reports against Stable 1.0, which was a developer-only release. You should have known this from the .0 -- we told you ages ago that 1.0 means broken, I mean, developer.

least stable program I've ever used

You really oughtta try some of the more experimental stuff.

Re:Stability

[flappinbooger]

I've actually made a video in Cinellera once, and it isn't the crashing I remember. It's the fact that compared to a program like Sony Vegas, editing in Cinellera is like flossing with barbed wire. If you try hard enough you can get the job done, but it really hurts.

Re:Expectations

[Anonymous Coward]

Sir, put down that bong, and step back slowly. "Just works" is rarely a term that applies to wireless networking, no matter what OS you're using, so I suggest you drop that doopey thinking right away.