Web 2.0 Start-ups by Numbers

I'm not the world's biggest fan of Guy Kawasaki, but these figures about his new Truemors site are interesting, not least this one:

7.5 weeks went by from the time I registered the domain truemors.com to the site going live. Life is also good because of open source and Word Press.

Life is indeed good because of open source - it's holding up practically the entire Web 2.0 edifice.

QualiPSo: EU OSS and Acronym Madness

This sounds great:

Leading European, Brazilian and Chinese information and communications technology (ICT) players announced today that they have joined forces to launch QualiPSo, a quality platform to foster the development and use of open source software to help their industries in the global race for growth.

The aim of QualiPSo is to help industries and governments fuel innovation and competitiveness in today’s and tomorrow’s global environment by providing the way to use trusted low-cost, flexible open source software to develop innovative and reliable information systems. To meet that goal, QualiPSo will define and implement the technologies, processes and policies to facilitate the development and use of open source software components, with the same level of trust traditionally offered by proprietary software.

Er, yes, and how will it do that?

Developing a long-lasting network of professionals caring for the quality of open source software for enterprise computing. Six Competence Centres – running the collaborative platforms, tools and process developed in this project – will be set up to support the development, deployment and adoption of OSS by private and public Information Systems Departments, large companies, SMEs, end users and ISVs.

Yes, yes, yes, and that will be done how?

Defining methods, development processes, and business models to facilitate the use of open source Software (OSS) by the industry.

Can't they just get stuck in and try it - you know, download, install, give it a go? Anything else?

Developing a new Capability Maturity Model-like approach to assessing the quality of OSS. This model will be discussed with CMM’s originators, the Software Engineering Institute (SEI), with a view to formalising it as an official extension of CMMI.

What? Maturity? What's this got to do with getting people to use the ruddy stuff?

QualiPSo is launched in synergy with Europe’s technology initiatives such as NESSI and Artemis, and will leverage Europe’s existing OSS initiatives such as EDOS, FLOSSWorld (http://flossworld.org/), tOSSad (http://www.tossad.org/) and others. The project will also leverage large OSS communities such as OW2 and Morfeo.

Oh, now I see: all this is just an excuse for more acronym madness. So it's basically just a waste of money, and a missed opportunity to do something practical.

But wait:

QualiPSo is the ever largest Open Source initiative funded by the EC.

OK, make that the biggest waste of money, and biggest missed opportunity yet.

Why couldn't they invest in a few hundred open source start-ups across Europe instead? Or, easier still, simply mandate ODF for all EU government documents? That single act alone would jump-start an entire open source economy in Europe. (Via Open Source Weblog.)

WAYN - Where Were You?

The Internet famously abolishes geographical location, but people are still located. This means that you often want to know where your family, friends and acquaintances are. Where Are You Now (WAYN) lets you provide your present and future locations for interested parties. It's an obvious idea - so obvious, in fact, that I wonder why it hasn't come along before. (Via Quoi9.)

Soonr or Latr?

Soonr is one of the few new startups that seems to be offering a service that's useful; it lets you access your PC from a mobile phone, and place calls via Skype using the computer. There's only one problem: it's not open source. Make that two: there isn't even a GNU/Linux client. Maybe it'll happen, sooner or later.... (Via TheOpenForce.com.)

Crushing the Hype

I have animadverted before upon the fact that I find TechCrunch - for all its undoubted virtues - just a little too breathless in its excitement over Web 2.0 startups. So a wry smile did play upon my lips when I came across the aptly-named Techcrush:

Techcrush will review the progress of web 2.0 startups 6 and 12 months after they debuted. Did their apps turn out to be a success or a failure?

No points for guessing which way most of them will turn out. (Via Alex Bosworth.)

OS VC Round-up

It's clear that serious venture capital is starting to flow into open source start-ups, but sometimes it's hard to stay on top of how much and to whom. Here's a handy round-up of who's got what recently.