Comments on: Crossroads: Free or Commercial Asterisk?

By: up to date

up to date — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 07:25:17 +0000

Many thanks – I ought say, impressed with your site. I will twit this to my followers.

By: methionine deficiency

methionine deficiency — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 05:43:18 +0000

telephone systems today are of course very complex and very efficient compared to the plain old telephone system that we used in the old days..

By: Metal Halide Lamp :

Metal Halide Lamp : — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 08:49:30 +0000

the great thing about the modern telephone system are those value added services like Digital Subscriber Lines which offer high;.~

By: Morgan Parker

Morgan Parker — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 07:02:05 +0000

modern day telephone systems are quite reliable and offers more services;~;

By: Genesis Alexander

Genesis Alexander — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 04:54:11 +0000

digital telephone systems today presents a great improvement overt the analog phone systems we used severa decades ago.;~

By: Jackson Hill

Jackson Hill — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 17:50:48 +0000

The telephone system we are using today still uses the legacy Tip and Ring -48 Volts line which is susceptible to noise.,.`

By: joe

joe — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 14:56:55 +0000

“Without us – Asterisk would cease to be.”

An interesting statement coming from someone who works for Fonality

By: roderickm

roderickm — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 19:12:53 +0000

Hi Tyler,

Most Free-Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) is commercial. It’s made for, or mostly used in, commerce. Read David Wheeler’s excellent essay: http://www.dwheeler.com/essays/commercial-floss.html

Commercial and Free are not opposing ideas, so your crossroads thesis is a false dichotomy. The only way to conjure this imaginary crossroads is to strictly define “commercial” solely as for-fee software and “free” solely as no-fee (gratis) software. This narrow manipulation of language overlooks the real power behind open source, which is the freedom (libre) to share ideas in the form of software. That freedom allows commerce too, but ensures that the code remains open and facilitates its own improvement regardless of use.

I think the word you’re looking for is “proprietary.” Proprietary — not commercial — is the opposite of Free-Libre Open Source Software. Proprietary usually means “closed source” as well, but sometimes proprietary software vendors make source code available under a license that prohibits the freedoms associated with FLOSS. This is the very reason many Open Source advocates choose to use the more-specific term FLOSS: it nails down the meanings of Open and Free.

As you acknowledged, Asterisk was created to satisfy a commercial need, yet it has always been free (gratis and libre). So where’s this crossroads? It doesn’t exist. You rely on characterizing commercial activities as being opposed to free in order to set the stage for your suggestion that Asterisk is moving to be less free and more commercial. The truth is that Asterisk has always been both fully free and fully commercial.

Sadly, your conclusion is exactly backwards. Asterisk was created out of commercial need, but now has enough users, contributors, and advocates to sustain itself without relying on any one company. In the unlikely event Asterisk’s creator-sponsor Digium were to fail, Asterisk would quickly be picked up by one of the many organizations that have built its house on this great platform. So the final claim that “without [profit-seeking companies] Asterisk would cease to be” is backward, at least in the case of your employer and mine. Without Asterisk, our companies would cease to be.

We at Digium are challenged daily by the threat of irrelevance, which drives us to great lengths to build community and move forward with the best ideas. Digium is committed to fostering a healthy community because the long-term success of Asterisk is essential to the long-term success of the company. We strive to offer compelling products and services that equip and enable Asterisk users worldwide.

And yes, the vibrant community of developers that surrounds Asterisk have varied motivations — for hire, for fun, for education, for business need — but that diversity reflects the resilience of the community, which is good. Some developers choose to align with the community and contribute code, while others are free to carry the code in another direction independently under the GNU Public License. We’ve seen plenty of independent forks of Asterisk struggle and fall into disuse when separated from this community. That’s the beauty of FLOSS: it allows the best ideas to win out in terms of code regardless of commerce.

The encouraging trend we see is that more and more businesses of all sizes are discovering the power of Asterisk. This despite — perhaps because of — the horrible economy we’ve experienced recently. Some organizations are buying proprietary systems that leverage Asterisk, some download Asterisk without paying a dime. Some buy training and support for Asterisk, which I’m thrilled to provide. In all these ways, Asterisk is growing quickly, into more and more businesses, which we at Digium think is a very good thing indeed.

rm
–
Rod Montgomery
Digium, Inc. | Director of Services

By: Leif Madsen

Leif Madsen — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 12:44:38 +0000

2 points:

* Yes, the book costs money, but the authors didn’t do it to get rich; we did it mostly to help the community. The book, (Asterisk: The Future of Telephony) is available under the creative commons license (free!). The costs are mostly involved in the production of the book, and for people who happen to want to support the effort of people who write documentation. Believe me, we’re not drinking Corona’s on the beach in the Caribbean living the high life :)

* Asterisk.com has nothing to do with the Asterisk PBX :)

I mean, I see the point of your article, but this isn’t just an Asterisk issue; this is an issue with all software. I’m sure the guys over at The Gimp don’t do this “just for fun”, or the guys at PostgreSQL, or any other open source project that has any sort of traction that isn’t simply a hobby project for a single author.

We should be touting the fact that Asterisk, which has been released for free the community (no cost to get *involved*), allows people to make a real living off of it without even *requiring* you to contribute anything back.

Because of Asterisk, I’ve found myself a career I really love, and have been able to do it full time, supporting myself, for the last 6 years running my own company. This is the truly wonderful thing about Open Source.

I could have made a career working with Nortel as well, but power would have been lacking, and the costs associated with getting involved with it astronomical in relation to the costs involved with Asterisk. I was able to start contributing almost immediately after working with it full time for 2 months while looking for a co-op job during college. That experience led to a rewarding, and sustainable career.

So the commercial successes built around Asterisk are a miracle; not something to be given a negative connotation.

By: Ian

Ian — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 12:59:59 +0000

I agree Asterisk, and to be honest Asterisk always has been a commercial product.
Too often people assume opensource means FREE, It doesnt it means the source is free and you are also free to change it.
That aside to deploy Asterisk you need skills, Now at home you could do this yourself, But in the Office, Yes if you work in the IT dept you could deploy it. But not for FREE as every minute you spend on it is a minute of salary that you employer has to spend. So this is not free. Then finaly you can employ a company to do it for you and provide support for you. Again obviously this isnt free. and It cant be the companies (Me for example) have to spend time and money on R&D, Test equipment (have you looked at the price of an ISDN simulator?) etc.

No Asterisk will become I guess more comercial as time goes on and I for one have no issues with this.

Ian