The value in IT lies within its exploitation to create “Information Systems”, the technology component is akin to bricks and mortar – of little value until constructed into a building. The value component comes from the business systems specialists who architect business solutions using the available technology components. The services offered by providers in the Free Open Source Software (FOSS) space are in levering the technology components delivered through FOSS to create Information Systems solutions, i.e. consultancy and support. This is nothing new, there are millions of systems houses around the globe who provide such services for proprietary packages, and their major revenue streams are in the provision of support and consulting services, the actual license revenue they receive is very small. It is directly akin to running a car dealership or selling computer printers – the revenue stream is not in the initial sale, it is in the post sale relationship. The report authors are either naive in believing that it was ever otherwise, or cynically manipulating the more naive consumers of their “report”.

Open source is essentially a statement, by software developers, about the over-valuation of commodity product by greedy software vendors – AT&T/Bell Labs, Microsoft et. al., who through transient monopolies massively overvalued their own contribution to the use of computing in the building of Information Systems – vendors who hype, position and sell their products as completed buildings when all they actually have to offer is a range of differently-coloured bricks. People will pay for value, and mature purchasers see far more value in services than in commodities. FWIW