Comments on: Open Source Poses “Huge Risk” To Organisations

By: Dwokfur

Dwokfur — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 08:56:37 +0000

It’s a shame to be Hungarian, sometimes.

By: Doug Mackey

Doug Mackey — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:14:22 +0000

He talks about the role of IT as a partner to the business and then rules out using a myriad of software which, his own company’s business and IT users have found useful? This isn’t partnership! Rather, it would seem that his interest is rather self-serving insofar as he doesn’t want his IT resources learning to modify and support OSS even if it would be in the best interests of the users! Unfortunately business is rife with these sorts of CIO’s who are there by virtue of some black box of skill sets rather than for the contribution they can make to the business!!!

By: ITwhiz

ITwhiz — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 19:24:30 +0000

What planet does this guy live on, and in which decade is he living? How clueless can somebody get about open FOSS? Man, is HE asking for it.

By: Yfrwlf

Yfrwlf — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:32:52 +0000

Then the GE CIO has his head in the sand or is spreading FUD, as anyone who knows anything knows better.

By: Chris Puttick

Chris Puttick — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 06:58:52 +0000

Set up a panel; I’ll happily serve on it as a CIO, I think I can line up a few others. Invite this Peter Gyorgy on to. Then let’s discuss software providers and development methods and risk.

Too risky for “vital mission critical applications”. IBM. J P Morgan. London and NY exchanges. Peugeot Citroën. Then of course there is Google whose entire business is based on open source.

The risk balance is in fact the other way. An open source application can be supported fixed by your own people, by contractors and by huge global companies providing support services. Closed source products can be fixed by the maker.

Open source products can be supported for as long as you want to have them; closed source products are supported as long as the maker wants to support them.

Now where is the risk?

By: Grant Johnson

Grant Johnson — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:14:18 +0000

This CIO has no clue. How does the source being secret make the software any better? How can the price being high make it better? I can make something, keep the source secret, and charge a huge price for it. Then maybe he will buy it, and I will be rich!

Quality and performance need to be evaluated without regard to the methodology used in the development. If you think that high price makes it good, you have not used any commercial ERP products. They are terrible and full of bugs, and the response from support, even when you show them exactly what the bug is takes weeks or months. At least if full source was available to anyone at all, I could do a crazy auction where the first correct fix got my money.

By: slice

slice — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:07:28 +0000

Should be titled, “GE has stock in Microsoft”

By: The Internet

The Internet — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 21:46:03 +0000

So how much did Steve Ballmer pay this guy ?

By: Mick

Mick — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 21:21:01 +0000

As someone who has to actually use GE software on a daily basis, I’ll say this: he who lives in a glass house shouldn’t throw stones. Buggy, incomplete documentation, inconsistent interfaces and incomplete features.

By: AC

AC — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 20:56:54 +0000

I wonder if any kickbacks the CIO might receive from the vendors of proprietary software might have something to do with his position. This sounds like the FUD scripts Microsoft was distributing to their sheep back in the 1990′s. If you’re going to disseminate FUD, you might try putting a bit of effort behind making it at least semi-plausible, rather than painfully obvious FUD.