Open Office May Soon Have Ads

[Mark76]

If this report in el reg is anything to go by

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/11/14/sun_pimpin_openoffice/

[poebae]

Oh well, I guess we'll have to remove them and compile from source :)

[s.fox]

Oh well, I guess we'll have to remove them and compile from source :)

Yeah, definitely remove then compile.

I wonder what ads are likely to be put into open office anyway? Anybody going to hazard a guess?

[Mark76]

Buy Microsoft Office? :lol:

[s.fox]

Buy Microsoft Office? :lol:

Now that would be highly amusing. :)

[SunnyRabbiera]

I call for a boycott and fork.

[Mark76]

Maybe the ads will only be in the Windows and Mac downloads :)

[Erunno]

I call for a boycott and fork.

I think you forgot the sarcasm tags. OpenOffice's development is conducted mostly by developers paid by large companies, be it Sun, Novell or Red Hat. I *very* much doubt that you'd find enough developers who would want or could take over such an old, huge and complex code base. The delusions some Linux users have about the easiness and prospect of success of forks never cease to amaze me.

About the advertisment: I can't blame Sun, the OpenOffice development is probably a black hole for them where money disappears and never seen again. Since Sun's revenue dropped in the past fiscal quarters they're looking for a way to continue development while at least covering the development costs.

[Cool G5]

I don't have any problem with the ad's.
Still without ad's ,OOO was better.

[billgoldberg]

Adds in Open Office, the flagship office suite of the Open Source community?

You just know that if this happens, a version without adds will be out the next day.

[SunnyRabbiera]

I think you forgot the sarcasm tags. OpenOffice's development is conducted mostly by developers paid by large companies, be it Sun, Novell or Red Hat. I *very* much doubt that you'd find enough developers who would want or could take over such an old, huge and complex code base. The delusions some Linux users have about the easiness and prospect of success of forks never cease to amaze me.

About the advertisment: I can't blame Sun, the OpenOffice development is probably a black hole for them where money disappears and never seen again. Since Sun's revenue dropped in the past fiscal quarters they're looking for a way to continue development while at least covering the development costs.

But do you want adds to be all over the place when you use the applications you need?
Come on, sun has enough money it doesnt need this BS.
FORK IT!
I REFUSE to use software with adds, thats why I use open source software in the first place!

[bash]

I guess we will have to wait and see. If you read the actual blog entry from the Sun CEO it's all very vague. He could mean a lot of things with that. But I the general trend he wants to go is a bit concerning. The java installer now "offers" you to install toolbars for you by default? I have never had much respect for companies that try these sorts of methods. If ads should indeed come to OOo that might be the final step that Novell (maybe along with IBM) goes and properly forks OOo. They already have a more or less forked version with go-oo, due to SUN not accepting a lot of patches. It has been suggested quite a few times that SUN should move OOo leadership to a more general entity like a foundation to revitalize the dev community, since it has been going slower and slower. But SUN hasn't been doing particularly good on the financial side lately, so I guess they are desperate for measures to generate income.

[SunnyRabbiera]

Yeh but they dont need this crap, a partnership with MS will cause us nothing but grief.
Hopfully Sun will keep its promise to make java fully open source so we can fork that, fork open office and make them add free like they are supposed to

[karellen]

But do you want adds to be all over the place when you use the applications you need?
Come on, sun has enough money it doesnt need this BS.
FORK IT!
I REFUSE to use software with adds, thats why I use open source software in the first place!

it's open source. you are free to modify openoffice to suit your needs

[beercz]

boycott and fork.
Sounds like a firm of lawyers to me!

Wonder if they will advertise in office?

[m4fia]

Are you sure they don't mean ads on there site :D because that could be it. And also, the ad's could be for Sun stuff, so they get free advertizing. Which i tottaly wouldn't be against. But as long as its not the ones that come up after i close the program. Also i use Steam (For Day of Defeat: Source, etc) and they advertize a game after i close a game or what not. And that doesn't really bother me much either.

So if it's not bad, then who cares. Also it might not even happen.

[earthpigg]

it wont be a 'boycott' OR a 'fork'.

December 1: OOo 3.1 comes out.
December 2: OOo 3.1 Redoux comes out, torrent is available here, here, and here.

rinse and repeat.

[M7S]

SUN isn't that stupid, I think. I doubt they put in any obtrusive ads in their suit. I would guess they put in some "sponsored by" in their splash screen or some ads on their download page. No reason to shout about forks yet. Wait and see.

[Erunno]

But do you want adds to be all over the place when you use the applications you need?

Well, I accept that companies need some kind of revenue to warrant the steep development costs they invest into a product. Open Source doesn't mean necessarily that creating a software product is void of costs, especially when you employ as many engineers as Sun. Or do you have an alternative business plan on how at least cover the costs, especially when considering that OpenOffice is not a part of Sun's core business (server solutions)?


Come on, sun has enough money it doesnt need this BS.

Sun is not bleeding money yet but their revenue has dropped considerably in the past quarters. If they actually start losing money Sun will have to cut costs and my bet is that this will hurt OpenOffice first.


FORK IT!

Yeah, and push Sun to be even more restrictive about licensing. There's no one stopping them from releasing the next version of OpenOffice under a more restrictice license which would prevent the fork from merging changes from the official tree into their own. Then you'd have just another bitrotting fork without enough developers. Need an example? Look at the glacial development of both the GNOME and KDE office suits. Can't have the cake and eat it, I'm afraid.


I REFUSE to use software with adds, thats why I use open source software in the first place!

I think you're confusing issues here.

[samjh]

I smell over-reaction by some posters.


who we'll be partnering with us to integrate their businesses and brands into our binary product distributionNotice the words "our binary product distribution". He isn't talking about the packages in Linux distros, but the binary copies supplied by Sun (eg. Windows installer downloads).

We might as well get peeved off by the big NVidia logo that appears when you start X with proprietary NVidia drivers. :rolleyes: Storm in a tea cup.

[Polygon]

i as well refused to use software that has ads. if open office ever gets ads, then im afraid i will have to stop using it.

[wersdaluv]

Good thing its open source

[s.fox]

Well perhaps its only in the Windows installer.

I also think that the ads will only be placed on the splash screen at worst.

The adverts would make them some money, so I can see why they would consider adding in the adverts.

I think the best thing we can all do is wait and see...

[Grant A.]

it wont be a 'boycott' OR a 'fork'.

December 1: OOo 3.1 comes out.
December 2: OOo 3.1 Redoux comes out, torrent is available here, here, and here.

rinse and repeat.

LMAO. You made me spit water all over my python book :(

Btw, forks usually end up merging with their original projects. Beryl & Compiz, etc.

[Vadi]

I wouldn't be using it. OOo costs a lot of money to develop, people don't pay a single dime for it, and say they'll take out the ads if they can - which is really quite selfish and unappreriative.

I don't want to have either, so I'll probably switch to Adobe Buzzword fulltime by then.

[andrewabc]

Nothing to worry about.
There is already a fork(?).

http://go-oo.org/

[jespdj]

I think you forgot the sarcasm tags. OpenOffice's development is conducted mostly by developers paid by large companies, be it Sun, Novell or Red Hat. I *very* much doubt that you'd find enough developers who would want or could take over such an old, huge and complex code base. The delusions some Linux users have about the easiness and prospect of success of forks never cease to amaze me.
You underestimate open source developers. Ofcourse it's not easy, but there are a lot of very smart open source software developers out there. A fork WILL happen if there are going to be ads in the "official" OpenOffice.

[Erunno]

Nothing to worry about.
There is already a fork(?).

http://go-oo.org/

As far as I know go-oo is just the upstream version of OpenOffice with additional patches which Sun won't accept. It still derives most of its code from the official upstream version so it's not really a fork but a customized version.

[Erunno]

You underestimate open source developers. Ofcourse it's not easy, but there are a lot of very smart open source software developers out there. A fork WILL happen if there are going to be ads in the "official" OpenOffice.

I don't doubt that a true fork might actually happen, just that it will be a succesfull one. We're talking here about dozens of paid developers who work solely on OpenOffice and know their way around the codebase versus a couple of potentially interested people who'd have to first understand hundred of thousands of lines of existing code and work on it in their free time. Unless of course Red Hat and Novell close the gap with their own people but than we're back at cooperate funding.

[daverich]

ok hows this for crazy..


I do wonder if having ads will make it MORE appealing to people who aren't used to open source software,- at least they can see where the money is coming from - it might make sense more to the unenlightened?

If they have to pay a fiver to remove the ads,- well all well and good, it's open source and more people will be using it.

Just a thought - my gut reaction is also to oppose monetising open office, or indeed any open source software - but there might be another side to this.

Kind regards

Dave Rich

[bashveank]

So um, what's the problem here? Everyone's talking about a boycot and fork, but no one's really said why they don't want there to be adds in the first place? Just can't stand the thought of someone turning a profit with software? Remember that you didn't pay for the software, you probably didn't even contribute to the code base, you'd be lucky to get it with adds.

[Skripka]

So um, what's the problem here? Everyone's talking about a boycot and fork, but no one's really said why they don't want there to be adds in the first place? Just can't stand the thought of someone turning a profit with software? Remember that you didn't pay for the software, you probably didn't even contribute to the code base, you'd be lucky to get it with adds.

Probably for the SAME reason MOST Firefox users also use Ad-Block or some equivalent. They are TIRED of wasting screenspace and computer power and being stuck watching ads they RLY don't give a flip for. EVERYTHING has a banner ad stuck to it--and the ads distract from the primary intent of the internet (and OpenOffice) in the 1st place-that is content (and getting work done).

I don't know about anyone else, but I've NEVER bought anything as a result of seeing a banner ad on the internet (most of my friuends and colleagues IRL are the same). Maybe I'm unique, and my ad-blocking habits are the downfall of the internet and the free world, I spose.

Yes advertising funds the internet. But if I want to watch ads, and see what kinds of wonderful products are out there, all I have to do is turn on the TV-where roughly 60% of screen time are advertisements (hewre in the US).

[bashveank]

Probably for the SAME reason MOST Firefox users also use Ad-Block or some equivalent. They are TIRED of wasting screenspace and computer power and being stuck watching ads they RLY don't give a flip for. EVERYTHING has a banner ad stuck to it--and the ads distract from the primary intent of the internet (and OpenOffice) in the 1st place-that is content (and getting work done).

I don't know about anyone else, but I've NEVER bought anything as a result of seeing a banner ad on the internet (most of my friuends and colleagues IRL are the same). Maybe I'm unique, and my ad-blocking habits are the downfall of the internet and the free world, I spose.

Yes advertising funds the internet. But if I want to watch ads, and see what kinds of wonderful products are out there, all I have to do is turn on the TV-where roughly 60% of screen time are advertisements (hewre in the US).

I don't understand this rationale, you don't drive down the highway with anti-billboard sunglasses, you don't punch your friend in the face whenever he wears a name brand shirt. Banner adds aren't that intrusive. I used to use add block, but I turned it off when I realized that adds don't really bug me and that they do help out the developer.

Adds aren't that intrusive unless you have a 7" screen, and the cpu cycles that are used to display the ad are negligible at best.

[Skripka]

I don't understand this rationale, you don't drive down the highway with anti-billboard sunglasses, you don't punch your friend in the face whenever he wears a name brand shirt. Banner adds aren't that intrusive. I used to use add block, but I turned it off when I realized that adds don't really bug me and that they do help out the developer.

Adds aren't that intrusive unless you have a 7" screen, and the cpu cycles that are used to display the ad are negligible at best.

Ads ARE intrusive when they are animated, and they DO lag your computer when they are poorly written for flash-which can be quite often. And Ads servers are OFTEN the main reason for slow webpage loading, IME.


Does your e-mail account have a spam blocker that you use, or do you read every piece of spam in your mailbox ? I thought so.

[-grubby]

I don't blame them at all.

[conehead77]

...you don't drive down the highway with anti-billboard sunglasses,...

If you sell me a pair, i will :)

[Mr. Picklesworth]

Adds in Open Office, the flagship office suite of the Open Source community?

You just know that if this happens, a version without adds will be out the next day.

Nah, if that happens people will finally see sense and switch to Abiword / Gnumeric.

Or write a new program based on modern word processing concepts. (And maybe use a normal user interface toolkit, too).

[tom66]

You know, he could mean:
- ads in the installer, which I have no problem with;
- sponsorship, e.g. brand the website with 'ACompany' in some places, and sell merchandise with 'ACompany' on it along with 'OpenOffice';
- sell an upgraded version (which they already do) through another company, and maybe in stores;
- ads/sponsorship of the about dialog, which I have no problem with;
- ads on the website - I use adblock - but others usually have no problem with this;
- or generally a deal, just as a 'good faith' to the company and promote them through viral means.

[zmjjmz]

Assuming they do put ads in OO.o itself, it's a futile effort. Unless they close up the source all that will happen is downstream packages will come modified sans ads.
It's kinda like how the guy who ported XChat to Windows is charging for precompiled binaries, while the guy one Google result down hosts the up to date precompiled binaries for free.

[Ozor Mox]

I don't doubt that a true fork might actually happen, just that it will be a succesfull one. We're talking here about dozens of paid developers who work solely on OpenOffice and know their way around the codebase versus a couple of potentially interested people who'd have to first understand hundred of thousands of lines of existing code and work on it in their free time. Unless of course Red Hat and Novell close the gap with their own people but than we're back at cooperate funding.

This would be unnecessary. All the "fork" would have to be is:

1. Take existing OpenOffice code when a new version is released.
2. Remove advertising code.
3. Release.

The people doing this don't have to implement all the new functionality themselves in competition with the official build, since the whole thing is open source.

Whether I do or don't stop using OpenOffice if this happens will depend how it is implemented. As long as the adverts aren't a major distraction or general pain in the backside, I probably won't mind that much.

People here make way too much fuss about what is, at the moment, pure speculation.

[smoker]

i've seen a few threads here suggesting linux or ubuntu adverts - would it be more acceptable to some if the ads were, eg, by canonical, promoting ubuntu?

personally i don't use openoffice that much, but if the ads annoyed me i'd switch to something else.

[Vadi]

I don't think Canonical spends any money on advertising atm

[Mark76]

I doubt most people would consider switching to Gnome-Office as long as it's missing half the applications commonly found in OO and MSO.

[Mr. Picklesworth]

I doubt most people would consider switching to Gnome-Office as long as it's missing half the applications commonly found in OO and MSO.

But "most people" don't really need more than a word processor and a spreadsheet tool, and Abiword / Gnumeric are fantastic alternatives there. They offer wonderful, tidy interfaces that are easy to learn and still have decent feature sets. They look pretty and have easy collaboration features. Next release they should do amazingly with collaboration features since they exist close to GNOME and will be influenced by the inclusion of Empathy / Telepathy.

For databases, we have the rapidly growing Glom. Mark my words: In the next year it will be top notch.

Presentations are the only weak link. Once Inkscape gets a few more interface cleanups and multi page support (which is bound to happen for its fantastically useful PDF features!), I think it will fill that roll perfectly.

[kernelhaxor]

Come on, sun has enough money it doesnt need this BS.

Not true .. They are in bad shape now .. Their published earnings indicate the same .. recently, I was talking with some folks from Sun

Personally, I don't mind the ads .. I use their OpenOffice suite for free .. the least I can do is help them make some money so they can giv me even better OpenOffice

[Polygon]

Assuming they do put ads in OO.o itself, it's a futile effort. Unless they close up the source all that will happen is downstream packages will come modified sans ads.
It's kinda like how the guy who ported XChat to Windows is charging for precompiled binaries, while the guy one Google result down hosts the up to date precompiled binaries for free.

you bring up a great point. Lets use xchat as an example. Sure, xchat is open source, and you can download a custom build of xchat for windows, but the guy who does the unoffical port hasn't updated xchat in a long long long time. Compiling on windows is such a hassle, and the instructions on how to do it are like a page long. Compiling stuff on linux is easier, so if open office does do this, then we might have to face the fact that the guys running the unoffical port don't keep up with the latest upstream versions, leaving mac and windows users out of luck

[Erunno]

But "most people" don't really need more than a word processor and a spreadsheet tool


Presentations are the only weak link.

But this weak link is a rather big one which makes OpenOffice rather irreplaceable for most people. Any would-be alternative to OpenOffice doesn't really need to apply as long as it doesn't feature the holy trinity of office suits consisting of a word processor, spreadsheet and presentation application. Although some is bound to say that his grandma doesn't use slides. :-P



Once Inkscape gets a few more interface cleanups and multi page support (which is bound to happen for its fantastically useful PDF features!), I think it will fill that roll perfectly.

I was under the impression that Inkscape is a drawing application for vector graphics. As such it has a totally different focus and workflow than a dedicated presentation program. Presenting Inkscape as an alternative to Impress or PowerPoint is grasping at straws in my honest opinion.

[forrestcupp]

This community is amazing. You love OOo because it's free, and you brag about how much better it is than MS Office. Then when the company that develops it is desperate to keep afloat, you turn your back on them and hate them.

It was just in the news that Sun is having to cut 6,000 employees. You wouldn't be able to brag about OOo being competitive with MS Office if it weren't for Sun dumping a lot of money into developers. It didn't get that way from a few rogue programmers working together.

[Erunno]

Not true .. They are in bad shape now .. Their published earnings indicate the same .. recently, I was talking with some folks from Sun

Fresh off the press: Sun will lay off 6000 employees to accomodate for their recent drops in revenue.

http://www.sun.com/aboutsun/pr/2008-11/sunflash.20081114.1.xml

EDIT: forrestcupp beat me to it.

[Mark76]

As long as the ads don't use flash I can live with them.

[andrewabc]

As far as I know go-oo is just the upstream version of OpenOffice with additional patches which Sun won't accept. It still derives most of its code from the official upstream version so it's not really a fork but a customized version.

True. But what would be so difficult about removing the ads?
If they can add code, then they can certainly remove code.

[DanTheFlyingMan]

I think I'll stick with Microsoft Office.

[Polygon]

This community is amazing. You love OOo because it's free, and you brag about how much better it is than MS Office. Then when the company that develops it is desperate to keep afloat, you turn your back on them and hate them.

It was just in the news that Sun is having to cut 6,000 employees. You wouldn't be able to brag about OOo being competitive with MS Office if it weren't for Sun dumping a lot of money into developers. It didn't get that way from a few rogue programmers working together.

it has already been stated in this fact that sun can not rely on ads for open office as long as it is open source. the majority of the distros will just disable ads at compile time, and sun will still not be making money, but would of already caused enough damage to cause people to stop using open office.

Im sympathetic that they are hitting hard times, but ads are not really the best way to go about it. Mostly for the above reason.

[Giant Speck]

I'd rather pay for OpenOffice than have it for free and have to see ads every time I used it.

[jonathonblake]

The delusions some Linux users have about the easiness and prospect of success of forks never cease to amaze me.

For all practical purposes, the OOo codebase forked roughly three years ago. Currently, there are four major variants of OOo. Each variant offers a slightly different set of patent violations, amongst other features.



About the advertisment: I can't blame Sun, the OpenOffice development is probably a black hole for them where money disappears and never seen again.

In theory, StarOffice revenue offsets the cost of OOo development.

xan

jonathon

[lifestream]

Who cares?!?! My hosts file blocks any and all ads.

[super breadfish]

Ads in OpenOffice would be a massive own goal so I guess they haven't told the whole story yet. The big opportunities for OpenOffice seem to be business, government and education, and neither of those will touch adware, not even with a very long stick.
Pitching "Let's migrate to a completely different office suite that's plastered in ads unless we hire a bunch of programmers to remove them" won't go down well with most management teams.

As for those who say "what's wrong with a few banners", apart from wasting energy, bandwidth and computer resources, with the ever increasing use of targeted advertising, I doubt it would be just "a few banners" for very long.

Clippy was bad enough, but at least he didn't try to sell me stamps and envelopes when it looked like I was writing a letter...

[Changturkey]

Time for Abiword.

[jonathonblake]

The big opportunities for OpenOffice seem to be business, government and education, and neither of those will touch adware, not even with a very long stick.

Education --- at least in the united states --- is based upon corporate advertising in the classroom.

SOHO businesses might accept software with advertizing. Major corporations probably won't.


Pitching "Let's migrate to a completely different office suite that's plastered in ads unless we hire a bunch of programmers to remove them" won't go down well with most management teams.

Pitching that (removal of adds) as part of the support service to the company will go down well, with that management team.


with the ever increasing use of targeted advertising,

If the text adds that gmail has are anything to go by, targeted advertizing is a marketers fabrication. Before I turned off Google text adds, I never saw one that was relevant to either what I was interested in, or related to the content of the email I receive.

xan

jonathon

[geoken]

Probably for the SAME reason MOST Firefox users also use Ad-Block or some equivalent. They are TIRED of wasting screenspace and computer power and being stuck watching ads they RLY don't give a flip for. EVERYTHING has a banner ad stuck to it--and the ads distract from the primary intent of the internet (and OpenOffice) in the 1st place-that is content (and getting work done).

I don't know about anyone else, but I've NEVER bought anything as a result of seeing a banner ad on the internet (most of my friuends and colleagues IRL are the same). Maybe I'm unique, and my ad-blocking habits are the downfall of the internet and the free world, I spose.

Yes advertising funds the internet. But if I want to watch ads, and see what kinds of wonderful products are out there, all I have to do is turn on the TV-where roughly 60% of screen time are advertisements (hewre in the US).

If you hate ads then don't partake in the content. Basically you're saying "I'll take your content, but I'll make sure I don't help cover your bandwidth".

For the record, I've bought everything from t-shirts to major pieces of computer hardware (ie. gpu) via ad-links.

[SunnyRabbiera]

Not true .. They are in bad shape now .. Their published earnings indicate the same .. recently, I was talking with some folks from Sun

Personally, I don't mind the ads .. I use their OpenOffice suite for free .. the least I can do is help them make some money so they can giv me even better OpenOffice

Man how come so many want adds in a allegedly open source software!
Open source is SUPPOSED to be add free for crying out loud!
Why do you want addware????
I say we just take up the slack before its too late, get the open office code and create our own office suite and screw sun for its mistakes.

[-grubby]

Open source is SUPPOSED to be add free for crying out loud!


I don't remember that part.

[Old_Grey_Wolf]

I think there may be some overreaction going on.

It didn't say ads. It said branding. In the business world the term branding has a loose definition; however, it is not flash ads or targeted banner ads.

Branding, like the SUN name and Logo that appears when OpenOffice loads, showing the version number.

What they are considering might be more in tune with co-branding.

Edit: Since IBM is a contributor to OpenOffice.org it could simply be a "Sponsored by IBM" adjacent to the SUN name and Logo already present at startup.

[73ckn797]

Just do not delete the latest version you had/have that does not contain ads, if indeed it comes to something like that.

[lykwydchykyn]

Everyone is aware, of course, that the version of OOo in Ubuntu's repos are not the binary distribution from Sun?

Everyone is aware that it's the go-oo fork of OpenOffice in there?

Everyone is aware that ubuntu would likely strip out any such advertisements and branding if it was really a problem?

Read the about box on your OpenOffice, if it came from the repositories. You'll notice this text:

"This product has been created by Debian and Ubuntu based on OpenOffice.org"

If you're worried that your Linux box will have adware forced on it, think again. Price isn't the only advantage of open source code.

[Newuser1111]

Adware?!
Should I uninstall OpenOffice off all of my computers(that have it) right now?

[Mark76]

No.

1234567

[forrestcupp]

I think there may be some overreaction going on.

It didn't say ads. It said branding. In the business world the term branding has a loose definition; however, it is not flash ads or targeted banner ads.

Branding, like the SUN name and Logo that appears when OpenOffice loads, showing the version number.

What they are considering might be more in tune with co-branding.

Edit: Since IBM is a contributor to OpenOffice.org it could simply be a "Sponsored by IBM" adjacent to the SUN name and Logo already present at startup.
Thank you. That's a good observation. I didn't bother to read the article, and I guess I should have. You can't really trust someone else's interpretation.

[Sephoroth]

*Selects to save a document in Writer*

*Selects directory to save it in*

*Is asked if a can of soda would like to be purchased*

*Selects No*

*Is requested to which I should be billed for can of soda*

Heh, most people here are probably over-reacting. Even in the worst case scenario, there would probably be a fork or alternative sponsored by Linux distro managers (i.e. RedHat, Novell, etc.) or opponents to MS (e.g. Google).

[bashveank]

Man how come so many want adds in a allegedly open source software!
Open source is SUPPOSED to be add free for crying out loud!
Why do you want addware????
I say we just take up the slack before its too late, get the open office code and create our own office suite and screw sun for its mistakes.

Open source doesn't mean ad-free, it means that the source code is not proprietary.
I want "adware" so that the developers of software that I find valuable can feed their children.

[stinger30au]

People here make way too much fuss about what is, at the moment, pure speculation.


unfortunately this happens *WAY* too much on these forums

[Giant Speck]

unfortunately this happens *WAY* too much on these forums

Well said. It is rather sad how much rumors flourish in these forums. I think the main reason it occurs is that many users don't read the original poster's article all the way through or at all. What they do see, however, is someone misinterpreting what the article meant, and they build off of that.

Furthermore, you will see, especially in this very thread, that people don't even read any of the thread's replies before replying themselves. They see the misinterpretation made at the beginning of the thread, and react upon that, without reading through the entire thread, where there the misinterpretation may have already been debunked.

Example:

Title of Thread: OpenOffice May Soon Have Ads

- OMG! I don't want adware!
- How dare Sun do this! It's open source!
- Pop up ads? In my OpenOffice?
- If you read the article, it did not say ads. It said branding, which means something completely different.
- OMG! I'm going to uninstall OpenOffice right now!
- I've had it with these m'fing ads in my m'fing office suite!

[TBOL3]

It's worse then that in this case.

Sun wrote an article.

The Register reported the article, and gave their analysis (which is good, even if their analysis is wrong).

The OP read the register, and reports it to us, w/o reading the original article. (This is actually fine, because he sighted the register, and didn't just site the original article).

Finally, people get all nasty, and are cranky because of the way the OP made things. (Which is fine if they site the OP, because the actual truth is based on the OP's history. The problem is that the OP has little actual credibility, about the same as a random newspaper boy, and so no one sites the OP, but all decide to site the register, or even worse, the actual blog from sun).

BTW, I'm NOT okay with adverts in OOo, but I AM okay with what the blog said. I'm fine with some branding, or maybe a few suggestions in the software. Say, for example, if your printing the file, and it suggests a printer to buy (if you don't have one anyway). Or if are adding some plugins, and it gives a link to a good plugin store. And for those of you who are even against that, I expect you to never use ubuntu, or firefox again, they do the same thing. Firefox advertises google, by using them as the default search engine, and ubuntu advertises their store when running proprietary codecs.

[mrgnash]

I think you forgot the sarcasm tags. OpenOffice's development is conducted mostly by developers paid by large companies, be it Sun, Novell or Red Hat. I *very* much doubt that you'd find enough developers who would want or could take over such an old, huge and complex code base. The delusions some Linux users have about the easiness and prospect of success of forks never cease to amaze me.

About the advertisment: I can't blame Sun, the OpenOffice development is probably a black hole for them where money disappears and never seen again. Since Sun's revenue dropped in the past fiscal quarters they're looking for a way to continue development while at least covering the development costs.

Removing the ads would (most likely) not involve a major revision of the code base. Remove the offending code, compile and release the binaries -- fork complete.

[Frak]

About the advertisment: I can't blame Sun, the OpenOffice development is probably a black hole for them where money disappears and never seen again.
Yep, just like xVM Virtualbox and Java.

If you haven't realized by now, the free OSS products from Sun are a mere indirect marketing scheme for their other products. Sort of like EEE, except they have no feeling to extinguish.

[jflaker]

Not true .. They are in bad shape now .. Their published earnings indicate the same .. recently, I was talking with some folks from Sun

Personally, I don't mind the ads .. I use their OpenOffice suite for free .. the least I can do is help them make some money so they can giv me even better OpenOffice

But EVERYONE's earnings are tanking.

[Solicitous]

About the advertisment: I can't blame Sun, the OpenOffice development is probably a black hole for them where money disappears and never seen again. Since Sun's revenue dropped in the past fiscal quarters they're looking for a way to continue development while at least covering the development costs.

Well being open source I doubt they would. Perhaps back in the StarOffice days (back when free but closed source and OpenOffice wasn't even a thought in their minds) they might have put in ads to generate revenue.

Ok putting money into OpenOffice might appear like a blackhole for Sun, but how much money do you think they would receive in donations? What about the value of Sun's stock? If they could produce a product and put it on say 20% of desktops...what would that be worth to them? How much does the development of OpenOffice help out StarOffice (a product I believe they sell)?

I don't believe it would ever happen. Same as Ubuntu wouldn't be released with ads....call it "commercial suicide"?

[cardinals_fan]

Well being open source I doubt they would. Perhaps back in the StarOffice days (back when free but closed source and OpenOffice wasn't even a thought in their minds) they might have put in ads to generate revenue.

Ok putting money into OpenOffice might appear like a blackhole for Sun, but how much money do you think they would receive in donations? What about the value of Sun's stock? If they could produce a product and put it on say 20% of desktops...what would that be worth to them? How much does the development of OpenOffice help out StarOffice (a product I believe they sell)?

Why is having their product on many desktops worth anything right now? They can make money in three ways:

a) sell an upgraded version (StarOffice)
b) sell support
c) advertise

They do a, but I doubt if they earn much. Not sure about b. C is the option for which popularity makes the biggest difference, and it's what they're considering.

[KiwiNZ]

This may well become a sign for the times. As the economic situation worsens and company profits are hit then the funds available for "free" products will come under pressure.

The projects will either retrench or have to find alternatives be it advertising or charging a purchase price for the products.

[mrgnash]

Oh, that reminds me, there has already been a few of forks of OOo. IBM's Lotus Symphony, Goo-oo for Linux/Windows, and NeoOffice for Mac/OSX.

Being an avid LaTeX user, it's not going to impact me much personally, but I do believe that it's important to have an open-source rival to MS Office out there -- and the formats that go along with it.

[SunnyRabbiera]

This may well become a sign for the times. As the economic situation worsens and company profits are hit then the funds available for "free" products will come under pressure.

The projects will either retrench or have to find alternatives be it advertising or charging a purchase price for the products.

yeh but free and open source software was supposed to prevent this, does this mean we have to give up our ideals of having free software without mindless adds and trials and BS like that?
I got away from software like that for a reason, and for it to become a standard on open source will make it no better then closed source.
If it coems to it then I guess I will use debian or something

[Giant Speck]

yeh but free and open source software was supposed to prevent this, does this mean we have to give up our ideals of having free software without mindless adds and trials and BS like that?
I got away from software like that for a reason, and for it to become a standard on open source will make it no better then closed source.
If it coems to it then I guess I will use debian or something

You are forgetting that open source does not have to be free (as in beer). You are also ignoring the fact that it has been established by a few other users that the article never mentioned advertisements. It mentioned branding, which is an entirely different thing.

And, darn it. It's spelled "ad," not "add." Advertisement doesn't have two ds.

[cardinals_fan]

yeh but free and open source software was supposed to prevent this, does this mean we have to give up our ideals of having free software without mindless adds and trials and BS like that?
I got away from software like that for a reason, and for it to become a standard on open source will make it no better then closed source.
If it coems to it then I guess I will use debian or something
The idea of FOSS is to make the source code available for modification/reuse. That's it.

Sun is in the midst of rather hard times. Deals like the earlier one with Microsoft and the proposed auction of sponsored ads on OOo downloads could help keep them going, and let OOo finally pay off. If Sun sets, you likely won't have an OpenOffice anymore.

[lykwydchykyn]

I think we can guarantee that it won't happen, mainly because:
- the vast majority of users hate having ads in things
- If it's open source, someone else will just compile your work sans adverts
- People who want to use the software will just switch to the ad-free version.

I mean really, considering that 2.8 "buntus" are born every day, what makes anyone think you'll be stuck with ads in your software?

[Capt. Mac]

yeh but free and open source software was supposed to prevent this, does this mean we have to give up our ideals of having free software without mindless adds and trials and BS like that?
I got away from software like that for a reason, and for it to become a standard on open source will make it no better then closed source.
If it coems to it then I guess I will use debian or something

I don't really see where you're coming from. The Free Software movement never had anything to do with getting away from advertisements, which you so vehemently claim. It's just about software that you can examine and modify if you so desire.

[tvtech]

these companies and people that write the code for this "free" software still need to make money and eat. so bring on the adds, i"ll ignore them like I do all the other adds. if you use this software like it enjoy it honestly you should either a. pay for it outright a reasonable price... say 15-25 dollars or buy support. <--- the latter is what all these companies are hoping for. it's called software as service. it employs more people and gives a better product. imho

[cardinals_fan]

I think we can guarantee that it won't happen, mainly because:
- the vast majority of users hate having ads in things
- If it's open source, someone else will just compile your work sans adverts
- People who want to use the software will just switch to the ad-free version.

I mean really, considering that 2.8 "buntus" are born every day, what makes anyone think you'll be stuck with ads in your software?
This isn't about ads in the software, it's about sponsored additional downloads available with updates or on initial download, just like many Google products. Because of that, it probably wouldn't even affect Linux users who use a package management system to install OOo.

[Giant Speck]

This isn't about ads in the software, it's about sponsored additional downloads available with updates or on initial download, just like many Google products. Because of that, it probably wouldn't even affect Linux users who use a package management system to install OOo.

I think someone already said that the OpenOffice in the repositories is a fork of Sun's OpenOffice.

[lykwydchykyn]

This isn't about ads in the software, it's about sponsored additional downloads available with updates or on initial download, just like many Google products. Because of that, it probably wouldn't even affect Linux users who use a package management system to install OOo.

I realize that, but I'm dealing in the theoretical at this point. Because having established that the original post was a misunderstanding, others have moved on to the suggestion that the US economic downturn will lead to ads in other free software.

FOSS is not necessarily about not having ads in software, but it is a pretty good antigen for anything generally obnoxious being injected into software. e.g, advertisements.

[earthpigg]

a lot of people here are saying things like this:


i as well refused to use software that has ads. if open office ever gets ads, then im afraid i will have to stop using it.

NEWSFLASH!

OOo has Sun ads now. look at the splash screen when you start it up.

[zmjjmz]

OOo has Sun ads now. look at the splash screen when you start it up.

That's branding, not ads.

[macogw]

Oh well, I guess we'll have to remove them and compile from source :)

Ubuntu doesn't use the binaries Sun releases anyway. In case you didn't notice, we've been able to open .xlsx and .docx and .pptx files since Gutsy. Sun's couldn't do that til OOo 3. We use the go-oo patch set, so I wouldn't be all that surprised if as part of the patching-OOo-into-shape thing Ubuntu removed the ads.

[Giant Speck]

Ubuntu doesn't use the binaries Sun releases anyway. In case you didn't notice, we've been able to open .xlsx and .docx and .pptx files since Gutsy. Sun's couldn't do that til OOo 3. We use the go-oo patch set, so I wouldn't be all that surprised if as part of the patching-OOo-into-shape thing Ubuntu removed the ads.

The thing is, there were never any ads in the first place. Nor will there be.

But you are right. If there were ads, or there were going to be ads, anyone using OpenOffice on Ubuntu wouldn't see them at all since the OpenOffice we use is actually a fork of the original Sun OpenOffice.

[jonathonblake]

If Sun sets, you likely won't have an OpenOffice anymore.

With Sun totally out of the picture, OOo would suffer for a year or two, then emerge as a far stronger office suite, than it has under Sun's mismangament. (Sun doesn't grok FLOSS, and probably never will.)

jonathon

[hanzomon4]

May not affect Linux users but what about OS X and Windows? Sorry pass, I don't do ads in my office suits

[Luke has no name]

With Sun totally out of the picture, OOo would suffer for a year or two, then emerge as a far stronger office suite, than it has under Sun's mismangament. (Sun doesn't grok FLOSS, and probably never will.)

jonathon

Defend your position.

[Giant Speck]

May not affect Linux users but what about OS X and Windows? Sorry pass, I don't do ads in my office suits

I think it would mostly affect the Windows and OS X versions as they aren't downloaded from repositories.

The worst that would happen though would be a small, unnoticeable branding that you'd probably see on the splash screen as the program is loading, and not in the actual program itself. I seriously doubt there will be a banner ad, a flashing ad, or any kind of pop up on an office suite.

[joe.turion64x2]

What if Google partners with Sun? It would be cool: adds by Google.

Thanks.
Joe.

[kernelhaxor]

Open source is SUPPOSED to be add free for crying out loud!

Never heard that .. the concept and definition of open source has nothing to do with being ad-free ..




Why do you want addware????
I say we just take up the slack before its too late, get the open office code and create our own office suite and screw sun for its mistakes.

I don't like adware either .. but I don't mind supporting Sun when they are in losses and therefore might halt Open Office development .. Though Open Office is an open source community project, it was mostly developed by paid developers ..

[dmn_clown]

With Sun totally out of the picture, OOo would suffer for a year or two, then emerge as a far stronger office suite, than it has under Sun's mismangament. (Sun doesn't grok FLOSS, and probably never will.)

jonathon

Why is it that whenever a manager refuses to fire employees or remove their benefits for the sake of the bottom line it is seen as mis-management?

To stay on topic, Sun does understand FOSS, they use it as free R&D for their proprietary applications ;)

[Chame_Wizard]

if OO.o has ad,i gonna use old vesion:lolflag:.

[jonathonblake]

Defend your position.
Defend what?

Sun has made it abundantly clear that votes for RFEs are to be ignored, until such time as it thinks it is suitable for that RFE to be a part of StarOffice.

The best example is when a Sun employee closed the RFE with the highest number of votes as being "this affects a few people, and is of no importance, or relevance to anybody outside of a small circle of people who are not really affected it."

And that is not the only such example where Sun has made it abundantly clear that OOo is nothing more than the stepchild whose existence would be best, if exterminated, and forgotten.

jonathon

[cardinals_fan]

With Sun totally out of the picture, OOo would suffer for a year or two, then emerge as a far stronger office suite, than it has under Sun's mismangament. (Sun doesn't grok FLOSS, and probably never will.)

Novell would probably take over some of Sun's role, but I'm not sure how much.

Defend what?

Sun has made it abundantly clear that votes for RFEs are to be ignored, until such time as it thinks it is suitable for that RFE to be a part of StarOffice.

The best example is when a Sun employee closed the RFE with the highest number of votes as being "this affects a few people, and is of no importance, or relevance to anybody outside of a small circle of people who are not really affected it."

And that is not the only such example where Sun has made it abundantly clear that OOo is nothing more than the stepchild whose existence would be best, if exterminated, and forgotten.

jonathon
What would you prefer? They have a bottom line to consider.