Open source assumptions and mentality
When companies use open source as an industrial tool to expand the ecosystem, the question often asked is: What if our customers take our open source version and code to make their own products and don’t buy our products? If you are not prepared, you will be asked abruptly. It is indeed difficult to answer, but if you think about it, you will feel dumbfounded. Based on the recent round of dialogue on the above issues, I decided to write down some thoughts.
We often say that open source is just a means and not an end, so what is the purpose. When it comes back to the purpose, it is usually easy for everyone to think of "commercial success". This term has the status of "political correctness" and "Amitabha" in our company. It is not very helpful to figure out the problem. Let us go back to our goal and original intention at the beginning of the establishment of the industrial development project: Why not do business that makes a fortune with a good sound, and open the door to welcome customers to do business? Do you want to use an open way to do ecology? Ok, here seems to want to start something, we are either the market has not yet formed, or the market is too fragmented and fragmented, we can not use a unified product to meet the needs of all customers in this market, we are trying to build a " Platform" to bring together some partners and ecosystems to meet customer needs. There is no doubt that mobile Internet, 5G and cloud in the future are all such businesses.
So returning to using open source as an industrial tool, we must have a basic assumption: Our business model may no longer be product sales, or not only rely on the competitiveness and value of the product itself, but also focus on the platform and ecology. Constructing a new business model or making necessary value transfer, of course, value transfer and price bearing are still two different things. Just like why Apple mobile phones are so expensive, although the expensive price is reflected in the terminal product of Apple mobile phones, it is because Jobs built iTunes, App store and other platforms and ecology around Apple. This is also the reason why Apple continues to increase prices. The ecology is getting thicker and thicker, and Apple feels that the ecology and value it brings to users through the mobile phone terminal box (the product itself is also very attractive) is increasing.
Another assumption is: once open source, customers, partners, opponents will get open source code, otherwise what is open source? And whether you will make a product that competes with you after you get the code is not restrictive, so the assumption here is that you should understand the law of open source in the open source place, know that you will face the code being obtained, and even only consume partners who do not contribute. , Including potential opponents. This brings us back to the nature and value of open source. Open source hopes that these codes can spread, spread and spread like viruses. It is hoped that others will use them and embed them in their own applications and products. The more they use, the more The better the deep integration, the more applications that can be grown on the open source code is a dream thing.
Remember that Ren Zhengfei said: "Without correct assumptions, there is no right direction...", so we must have correct assumptions based on open source for ecology.
It is not enough to have correct and reasonable assumptions. It just means that you have a clearer strategic thinking, but you will still encounter many practical difficulties at the implementation level. We all say that in the future, we must be altruistic and self-interested in the future, and in the face of the market, we must "take only one scoop of three thousand weak waters" and not compete with partners for benefits. But just as Mr. Wang Yangming, the master of the mind of the Ming Dynasty, once warned us: it is easy to break the mountain, but it is difficult to break the heart . How to break the inertia of zero-sum game and competitive thinking that has always been formed in the heart, and even the genes and human aspects of wanting to "take advantage" rather than "altruism" must have a correct mentality. That is to see partners and opponents come to "take advantage" to feel very happy and happy. Rather than deliberately digging holes, whether you can use high-quality code to open source, but also very sincerely to promote, to help partners master the open source platform and code. Just like the way of welcoming guests in Du Fu's poem "Ke Zhi", "The flower path has never been swept by the guest, and the gate is now open for the king.", in this way can we get "the spring water in the south and north, but see the gulls every day Come." The effect of a rush of partners. This is not only a state of mind, but also a mindset and pattern, and it is the state of mind that leaders can have.
In summary, even though I encounter a problem, I generally think about whether it is a good problem or a bad problem. For example, the question mentioned at the beginning is obviously not a good question, because there is a paradox, because open source is to break the product sales model, and use the paradox to ask questions, obviously not to clarify the problem, but a kind of questioning and Questioning, even raising the bar. You should not generally answer bad questions, but given that you are often asked such questions in the company, think about it carefully, and you can do more than you can laugh or cry.
In summary, once you decide to use open source as an ecosystem, you must have the assumption that the business model needs to be transformed, and accept more cruel product competition or introduce rivals. The mentality is: the mentality of the leader, seeing partners and opponents using open source code is happy rather than reluctant, let alone entangled or smashed. Google has set a good example in this regard, which is why Google's open source is almost always successful. The whole world hopes to take advantage of Google, and it has also achieved Google's industrial status. At this time, "commercial success" is natural. Things.