Why would you market anything but OpenOffice?

I have been sitting on the sidelines too long now and wondering how and when to start blogging. OK, so I procrastinated for ever! So here we go...

I am a marketing guy so perhaps my views differ from the deep technologists out there, but there are basically two options when it comes to office productivity --  Pay for it, and have little or no control, or get it free and have the ability to influence the community on where the product goes. The choice seems simple to me -- OpenOffice it is!

I personally think that this product is the gold standard for a consumer friendly product that has grown up under the FOSS mantra. Now don't get me wrong, there are things I don't like about the product, but overall this product is just wonderful. It makes perfect sense to me why IBM joined OpenOffice.org, they can now be associated with the movement away from proprietary technology to open standards (ODF) based offerings. Similarly when Google started bundling StarOffice (Basically OpenOffice) into the Google Pack it just seemed -- DUH naturally they would do it! What else would come close? I am sure it didn't take the marketing groups at Google or IBM long to decide:
   "Hmmm should we go with OpenOffice, or..um  errr um... urrr.."

So please tell me why Novell is going about trying to discredit OpenOffice.. I just don't get it. Simon has an excellent blog on this, and Jim too goes to great lengths to tell the world what Sun is doing. But, to me the fundamental question is really a marketing one. Does a company want to go it alone (bad idea!) or be part of a bigger movement? You marketing guys at Novell.. can you at least explain to Mr Meeks that this doesn't help Novell?

-Mark

Posted at 12:58PM Oct 04, 2007 by Mark Herring in OpenOffice  |  Comments[4]  |  | |