Cracking the iPhone in Italy

A few days ago, while I was in Italy, I met a journalist of Il Sole 24 Ore, the Italian equivalent of the Financial Times. We had lunch and talked about a million things, among them the iPhone. Tuesday, he wrote an article about me where he pretty much stated that I cracked the iPhone... A bit too much, but journalists like hyperboles.

The same day my mom read the article and asked me what cracking meant and whether I stole something, with a slight worry I could go to jail. Considering the software was called Jailbreak, she wasn't too far from reality. I felt bad but I assured her I did not steal anything and that I am definitely not a hacker: I wish I could be one but I lack the skills for it.

Then on Skype I received a request to connect from Zibri. He is THE guy who made it all happen. The one who gives us Ziphone and allowed third party apps to be easily installed on iPhones. I was surprised at first, then shocked when I noticed he was asking for a connection in Italian.

Is Zibri Italian? Did the iPhone freedom derive from there?

Yep, he is. He lives in Rome. A friend of him read the article and asked him "who the heck is that guy who said he cracked the iPhone, didn't you do it?". Oopss. I had a nice chat with Piergiorgio (he did not call me to complain after all...) and I hope we'll do something together soon. He definitely seems a skilled individual :-)

Anyway, glad to hear that Italy is ahead of the pack in mobile once again. I had no doubts, but I still have to fight that perception every day. As quoted in the article, I had someone recently who asked me "Yeah, Ferrari looks great, you can tell it is Italian. But where do they get the engine from?". No, we do not get them from Germany. They are built in Italy, as Maserati, Ducati, Aprilia and more. They are the most reliable in the world. And the electronics too. On every Formula One car. We have the best engineers in the world, but we do not advertise them as we should. It is a high priority on my task list: it has to change. I am fed up with being know just for making pizza and clothes ;-)

Surprise: it is a mass market phone :-)

Well, I can't say I got it right. The Apple conference was really boring. Nothing new. Nothing special. It was still much better than Italy's game, so I casually followed Jobs presentation instead ;-)

I believe the only big news is the price of the 3G iPhone: I predicted lower than $200 for the iPhone mini and it is $199... This price makes it a mass market device. It will cost less than iPods. Yes, it is subsidized and you have to pay the operator for that, but that is a cost you already are paying (with your current phone). So if you sum iPod and your phone, upgrading to iPhone is a cost saving... That's quite interesting.

What is curious is that Apple gave up the model that seemed to change the game in mobile: they are not getting a share of revenues from the operator anymore. They are like any other device manufacturer. It is a step back (a big one) and I believe it was a blow in Jobs' face by European operators (due to the lack of sales in the Old Continent). I was reading the Financial Times on the plane and the contrast with the US is spectacular: in the US everyone calls the iPhone a success, in Europe a failure...

Now, Apple probably figured out that instead of selling 10M iPhones and make money with calls and data, they could sell 30M and make the same money (margins on HW are 30% max, so they need to triple their revenues to make it even with the loss of rev share).

And AT&T figured that they could subsidize $200 of an iPhone, and raise the data plan from $20/m to $30/m, therefore making $240 more in 24 months...

That's it, you chop the price and you make the niche bigger, without introducing anything new... Everyone is happy.

Oohh, they did introduce something interesting, though. It is called MobileMe, the evolution of the .Mac (not a success, by all means). For just $99/year, you get syncing on it. Or you can use the Funambol client and myFUNAMBOL and get it for free, plus it works on more phones, more backends and you have the code to play around with it... In any case, this is another sign that syncing is hot and everyone wants a piece of the puzzle (good for us).

BTW, did you notice the stark contrast from the enterprise solution (ActiveSync) and the consumer one (MobileMe)? Phil Schiller on stage called the Microsoft protocol ActiveStink... Way to push it in the enterprise... I believe RIM can sleep well for a little more, but they have to be careful...

Question before going to bed: why is Apple not using an open protocol such as SyncML? Why do they have to do everything closed? It is just too sad. Apple could be 10 times bigger but they choose not to. Everyone has its limits.

The iPhone surprise

I have been predicting most of Steve Jobs moves lately with a good degree of accuracy. From the iPod Touch to the Macbook Air (the one I am writing this post with...) and more.

Ok, I got lucky...

Tomorrow, however, is another big day. I know you are thinking Steve Jobs keynote at Apple WWDC in San Francisco. I am actually thinking about Italy playing its first game in Euro 2008...

---- useless comment ---- useless comment ----
Do you realize that Apple has put the WORLDWIDE conference of developers the week of Euro 2008?? Nobody in Italy and the Netherlands will care less about the keynote tomorrow... This shows you the lack of priority management in Cupertino. They would have never put a conference the day of the Super Bowl, I can guarantee you that...
---- useless comment ---- useless comment ----

Coming back to Apple, tomorrow is their big day as well. The new operating system for the iPhone will be unveiled (iPhone 2.0), together with the Application Store and a bunch of new apps.

Everyone knows they will announce the 3G iPhone. Most predict it will have GPS as well and it will be thinner. I agree.

That's it. Nothing more. Boring news. A phone an AT&T VP told us about six months ago. BOOORING.

Not a chance, I believe. Jobs likes to surprise people. He will announce all that but something more. Something that will make people say "WOW, they did it again!".

Apple is known to launch a product and then work on it until it is perfect, branching off children. They started with the iPod, then they did the mini, the nano, the shuffle. Some were bad (like the first shuffle) but then turned out great in the next generation (like the last shuffle).

My prediction is that Apple will launch an iPhone baby. A mini iPhone. A mass market phone (the original iPhone is going to be sold as an enterprise product in Italy, at 500 euros or so...). Unlocked. Only available in the US stores, initially. Below $200.

What are the odds I am right? Very minimal, borderline zero ;-) But if Apple launches a mass market phone tomorrow, then Steve Jobs might be reading my blog for real... I wrote 18 months ago that the iPhone was going to be a niche product: it is actually turning out to be a niche product (although the good news is that the niche is growing ;-) More in Europe (where they sold just a few) than in the US. What is clear to me is that a mass market phone would be a game changer.

In any case, I'll find it out once the game will be over.

Open Source BlackBerry

Now, I have been caught on tape beating a BlackBerry once, but we left in good terms. So much that today we have announced we actually love the BlackBerry...

Funambol has released two clients for BlackBerry today:

1. A push-email client, with integrated address book. Why would you need it?? Well, if you are like most, together with your work like, you also have a personal life. If you don't, then forget it, we do not like you anyway ;-) If you do, you might want to keep your BlackBerry email client for your enterprise life (with its own address book), but now you can get a separate client to check your personal email (e.g. AOL, Google, Yahoo, Hotmail, any POP/IMAP, and so on). The address book is separated, but it is synced on the device. So it is fast
2. A PIM-sync client, a tool to synchronize on your BlackBerry contacts, calendar, task and notes (also known as PIM), coming from the Funambol server. This is for those who do not like BIS (BlackBerry Internet Service) that much, because it does not sync your PIM stuff on the device. It is a full BlackBerry experience, with a consumer angle. And it is open source, extensible, it supports a lot of backends and more.

On my BlackBerry, I have both. I use myFUNAMBOL and I push my Outlook to it (with the Funambol Outlook plug-in). And I get both push email and PIM sync on my phone.

How do you get them? The push-email client signing up on myFUNAMBOL. It is delivered to your phone, no sweat. The PIM-sync connecting your BlackBerry browser to http://my.funambol.com/bb/plugin.jad.

Here you have a brief video of me using the Funambol BlackBerry client. It is just the first release, but it is quite good, in my opinion. And it is obviously all open source (actually, the PIM sync has been built pretty much by the community, with zero or so help by Funambol employees... I love open source ;-) More to come, stay tuned.

The Google of Mobile

Today I read an interview with Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google) on the Frankfurter Allgemeine (do not worry, it is not in German...). CEOs of US companies tend to say more when they speak with foreigner reporters, I am not sure why... Therefore, the interview is very interesting and a recommended read.

One statement from Eric pops up in the interview:

"mobile will be a larger business than the PC-Web"

Now, I am definitely having a hard time disagreeing with him ;-)

However, as Matt wrote, Google is not exactly leading in mobile. Android is a nice thing but it is not even available yet. Apple is way ahead of them, with a proven model (and getting a bit more open every month). Nokia is light years up in front. Even poor Yahoo is leading them...

Beside catching up, I feel there is an intrinsic difference between PC-Web and mobile, that puts Google in a tough spot: the mobile phone is a communication device. It is meant to communicate, not browse. With voice or data.

The leading data application on a mobile phone is and will be the messaging client. SMS, texting, email, IM, social communications. The browser is not going to be even close. And Google built its entire business on browsing.

How do you monetize mobile messaging? With advertising (and on this Google is strong).

However, for Google to dominate in mobile, they have to find a way to dominate in messaging (not in browsing). Gmail is not the way, in my opinion. Check the amount of users on Hotmail, Yahoo or Gmail. Numbers are secret but rumors say that the first two run in the hundreds of millions, the last one in the lower tens of millions (only geeks use Gmail... How many of us do you think there are out there? Thank God, not that many ;-)

The Google of Mobile will come from mobile messaging, ad-based. Anyone comes to mind? Just kidding :-))

Android -v- LiMo -v- Funambol?

A post on the BFF caught my attention this morning. The title: "Android -v- LiMo -v- Funambol". Now, being put against two operating system initiatives is interesting ;-) Then I read the source of it, which is an article on ZDNet by Dana Blankenhorn. The title: "Whose mobile open source community will deliver?". Much better, now we are not fighting anyone, but we are battling to deliver.

Dana's article starts from the consideration that Android is too close to be open... And that LiMo is "a corporate billboard". Then he adds:

This is a mistake, both on the part of the companies involved and on the part of the industry. If mobile Linux is to really take off, then a development community must be activated.

This week Funambol made the first move to do just that with the launch of its Funambol Forge.

The new forge has many of the tools you look for in a good community site. The question is whether it will attract mobile developers generally, or just those who care about Funambol’s own software.

I know that corporate-owned forges are usually devoted to a corporation’s own software, but it may be time for that to change.

If other mobile projects won’t develop high-quality forges with good community tools, why shouldn’t Funambol Forge become the center of the action?

In like the thought. I would love the Forge to aggregate the entire mobile developers community. Our community is not building just an operating system, but a complete mobile platform for developing Mobile 2.0 applications. From getting the application on the device, to delivering the data to it, via a push mechanism, to managing the entire device. Full circle. Mobile operating system independent.

Certainly, if you have a mobile project with an AGPL license, we'll be happy to host you. Google does not... And LiMo does not even allow you to talk to them ;-)

Mobile operators buying Mobile 2.0 startups

I wrote about the ZYB acquisition by Vodafone last week. The main news for me is that contact sync is hot, and that owning a user address book is one of the most important goal for a service provider (and a content provider...).

There is another angle though, more generic than contact sync:

Vodafone - a mobile operator - has acquired a startup, a Mobile 2.0 startup.

This is big news. If you were to go for the quick bucks (some days I regret deciding to go for the billion dollar company ;-) you had few options. Mostly, Google. But they do few acquisitions a year. Or maybe Nokia. In the old days, Yahoo, but who wants to sell to them today? That was it.

Now, the mobile operators come to play. If you have a cool mobile application/service, mostly Business to Consumer (B2C), you have a chance to be snapped by Vodafone. Or one of the other 70 mobile operators out there. It is a long list with lots of money.

Mobile operators are realizing they will become a data pipe. They can't launch services now. It is too late. To prevent the pipe nightmare, they need to buy services that are up and running, to be able to have a presence around social networking and everything around Mobile 2.0. And they have to do it fast...

Vodafone is the big gorilla. They moved. Everybody noticed. Look out for the next one...

SugarCRM project of the month

What I coincidence. We just announced the Funambol Forge and one of the best Forge out there (SugarForge by SugarCRM) announces one of "our" projects as project of the month.

It is the Funambol-SugarCRM Connector by Phil Shotton. Phil is a great guy and he deserves this recognition. He put together two cool projects (sorry if you feel I am not modest, but SugarCRM is a really cool project :-)) And I feel mobilizing a sales force automation product is quite a need, which is just going to get more important with time.

Let me steal the Q&A from the SugarForge (hoping John won't sue me ;-)

Why are you a leading contributor in the SugarCRM community? What are the benefits that you experience from your involvement?
I started using the original Sync4j connector to fill a business need, and started contributing to its development. Then I was asked if I wanted to take over project lead. I felt it was my opportunity to give something back to the community. Being involved gives me an opportunity to do something of wide value, teaches me about the value (and difficulties) of community-based development and puts me closer to the end user than is normally achievable when writing software.

What inspired you to create this project?
Business need - I didn't want to have to maintain multiple calendars and contact lists, and I didn't want to be tied to Microsoft products so I was looking for an adaptable synchronization solution. I am grateful to the original developers who started the work on the connector which fulfilled most of these needs, and the great thing about open source is that if the solution isn't quite perfect you can go in and fix it. After doing some bug-fixes and improvements I was asked if I could take over the project and I've been working on it ever since. There's still a lot of features I'd like to add!

What business pain points were you solving specifically?
Managing multiple calendar and contact lists across multiple people, working on disparate sites and wanting to share information. I started my own company with some colleagues and we wanted to be able to share information across applications and platforms. We run Linux and Microsoft Windows so the solution had to work for both platforms.

Is there anything that the users should know about those? Something hidden/new in this project? Think of this as an opportunity to describe how it works to a user.
Synchronisation sounds simple but is quite complicated, particularly against a multi-user system like SugarCRM. I'm continually working on improving the synchronisation process, making it faster, more flexible and more error-proof. I'm also trying to minimise the install pain while still supporting more versions of SugarCRM. The hardest problem is testing, as there are a large number of potential use cases and also a number of platforms and versions of both SugarCRM and Funambol. I'd like to build some more automated tests to try and avoid bad releases going onto SugarForge.

What would you say to encourage additional community participation?
The more you contribute, the more you get back. It's a sort of selfish altruism. If you want some capability or feature, you are more likely to get what you want if you play an active part in its development. Even if you're not a programmer you can contribute ideas, suggestions, be willing to test and so on. The more you do the better the software will get, and the more you (and the rest of the community) will benefit.

What do you want to build next for Sugar Suite?
As a full time software consultant I don't get a huge amount of time to spend on Sugar, and there's lots of things I'd like to improve with the connector, such as Task list sync, email sync, more flexibility in selecting and filtering, and so on. I'd also like to work on building a really good duplicate detector for contacts and calendar, with fuzzy match logic and merge, to clean up all those duplicates that slowly accumulate and clutter up the system.

Thanks Phil, keep up with the great work!

The new Funambol Forge

It took us way too long, but finally the Funambol Forge has been launched.

At the new Funambol Forge, developers and other community members can work on mobile projects, share technical tips, and download software and documentation. The new forge houses source and binary code for the open source Funambol Community Edition and many Funambol-based community projects. It incorporates a new Discussion Services area that provides both mailing lists and online forums, as well as a new online support forum for the myFUNAMBOL portal. It is also the access point for all of Funambol's community programs, such as the Code Sniper and Phone Sniper programs.

In a nutshell, it is the site where you find everything Funambol Community, from the core software to all the projects around it (there are a lot, dispersed over many different sites...), plus the mailing lists and the forums. All in one place.

Our Community Manager Stefano Maffulli is the guy that made it happen. Yesterday, he fought the daemons of Internet Explorer in an epic battle, beat them and delivered a first release of the Forge (more will follow, the interface needs work). The Forge was with him. I hope it was the lady displayed in Roberto's post...

Mobile contacts sync is hot

Contact synchronization is the backbone of social networking, in my opinion. Your "friends" are in your address book. Syncing them on all your devices is a key element of your social life. I always said that the company that manages to "own" your address book will own the war of social networks.

Among those that tried, definitely there is Plaxo. Thursday, they were acquired by Comcast. Just when they started moving towards mobile (they are using the Funambol client for Windows Mobile).

Friday, ZYB was acquired by Vodafone. They are a pure mobile address book sync, based on SyncML. Cool company. I met the CEO and I am happy to hear he is a rich man now. He deserves it because I have seen plenty of mobile sync companies but ZYB appeared to me as the best one from the get-going. And Vodafone is the biggest name in mobile. An acquisition by them means a lot.

Now, if service providers are out acquiring mobile contact sync companies, what does it mean?

That mobile contact sync is hot ;-)

If you are one of the service providers that is thinking "and now, what can I do?", I have a suggestion for you. Check my.funambol.com. It works as well as ZYB and Plaxo, when it comes to contact sync (and probably a bit better ;-) You can have it branded and with push email as well. Just give me a call. I have set up a hot line for contact sync yesterday...

When SaaS SuckS

As you might know, I am a big fan of SaaS (software as a service). I believe the entire world will move towards this model, with most of the applications used directly from a hosted site.

The first one to go is usually email. The second is the sales force automation tool. In the case of Funambol, both are outsourced. We use a hosted Zimbra for email and Sugar On Demand for sales force.

The issue with SaaS is that you do not control your data. You give your data to someone else and you pray they do not screw up with that. Companies that become successful have a 99.99999% clean record on this, or they go out of business very fast. Unfortunately for me, I hit one of those.

I use Outlook on my PC and the Zimbra Outlook plugin (definitely not the best piece of software Zimbra did, but that is another story). My PIM data gets pushed to myFUNAMBOL from Outlook and from there to the device I am using at the moment (currently, an iPhone and a Windows Mobile, but I am moving to BlackBerry soon... Stay tuned). Everything works great and I am a happy camper.

I have only one issue. When I am done with reading an email that it does not need to be stored in a particular subfolder, I hit the Delete button. One click, the email disappears and gets stored in my Trash. Once in a while (do not tell me it does not happen to you) I find out that one of the emails I deleted included actually something interesting. Not a problem, because I can search for them.

Unfortunately, our SaaS provider for Zimbra - a company called SonomaIT - believes my data is theirs. That they own my data, just because they host it. Therefore, once in a while they clean up MY trash. With no warning, my trash gets emptied and some important emails disappear. This drives me nuts: it is MY data, not YOURS. DO NOT TOUCH MY DATA!!!!

Now, I know what you are thinking: "if you really care about those emails, why don't you put it in a separate folder?".

Why? It is my data. I can put it anywhere I want... And it takes a millisecond to hit the delete button and a few of those to move an email with the mouse to a TrashThatDoesNotGetDeleted folder. The most precious thing I have is time. My data is my data. My time is my time. Do not mess with it.

That said, although some of the SaaS providers might be clueless, I still believe in this model. Clearly, I would have fired my IT Manager, if the system was in house. Now he has an excuse because the system is not in house. And I have a contract with a third party that I need to sue for Illegal Trash Cleanup. Life is tough...

But SaaS is still the way to go. Maybe not with SonomaIT.

Funambol on my Dash

I wrote before about the integration of myFUNAMBOL and the car navigation Dash Express. Today at Where 2.0, Dash made the official announcement of their Dynamic Search API and announced a few very cool applications from their initial partners list. One is ours, which you can see below.



The full list includes:

• Hunting for the home of your dreams? Real estate leader and innovator Coldwell Banker® allows consumers to search for homes with the “Coldwell Banker Home Search” button. It allows Dash drivers to access real estate listings and property details from their vehicle and instantly create a route to them.
• When and where is my meeting? Access calendar events, then dynamically route to meetings with Funambol’s “myFUNAMBOL Calendar” button. It allows Dash users access to their electronic calendars (from virtually any source, e.g. Outlook, Yahoo! and Google) from their Dash Express. Calendar items are updated automatically and users can route directly to any address listed.
• What’s that tune? Mediaguide enables Dash Drivers to easily find out the names of tunes playing on their radios. By simply taping the “BakTrax Radio” button, Dash users can see a list of the last three songs that just played on their favorite AM or FM stations.
• Speed trap ahead? Furthering Dash’s belief in the power of a driver network, the “Trapster® Find Traps Now” button not only gives Dash Drivers access to Trapster’s information about live speed traps and red light sensors, but also enables Dash Drivers to contribute speed trap information back to other Trapster users in their area.
• Is it going to rain? Access live, local weather information with WeatherBug’s “MyWeatherBug” button. It provides Dash Drivers with up-to-the-second information about current and future weather conditions while on the road from the largest, most precise weather network in the world.

If you haven't done it already, you should get one ;-)

Linux flies on Delta

Last time I went skiing in Utah (gosh, it seems like a year, and it was ten days ago...) I was impressed by the video system. It had live Dish TV, exactly as JetBlue (that sports DirecTV). A tons of CDs of quality music (and I could plug in my iPhone headset) and games. In particular, I liked the multi-player game, very cool because you play against the other passengers and you know who owns the highest score (it gives you the seat number).

On my way back, I was a bit less impressed when the thing in front of me rebooted. I noticed only mine rebooted, the others were working. Then one by one, most rebooted. I probably was the only one not swearing, but looking at the boot process: it had a penguin in it.

Cool to see the penguin. Much less cool to see it five times in a 90 minutes flight. I believe I have seen Linux automatically reboot more times on that flight that in my entire life. Who wrote that application??

When Web 2.0 meets Mobile 2.0

Yesterday we have announced a partnership with Laszlo. They are the leader in open source Rich Internet Applications (RIA), that is the fancy little apps that run inside a browser and make it look like a desktop. In a word, the Web 2.0 engine. Their target is consumers, via service providers (sounds familiar ;-)

One of the apps they launched as a vertical is email, with contacts and calendar. This sounds familiar too... If you haven't tried the application, I would definitely recommend you do. They have a free service called goWebtop, which allows you to use their web email client to read your personal email on the web (via IMAP), and they just added a preview of their new calendar interface - which is the most beautiful calendar interface I ever seen (and I am picky, when it comes to user interfaces...).


They do not do collaboration and they do not offer a mail server, so they do not compete with companies like Zimbra, OpenXchange, Scalix or PostPath. They have "just" a web client. The match with us is easy to see. They bring the Web 2.0 experience to the consumers, we bring the Mobile 2.0 experience to the consumers - powered by advertising. Very very cool.

You'll hear more from this partnership soon...

Funambol plus Asterisk, Blackberry and eGroupware

I found this nice post talking by Tony Maro about a deployment of Funambol for a Blackberry, integrated with Asterisk and eGroupware. Let me repost it here because it is short, but full of very interesting notes.

This is a near perfect solution. I run an Asterisk Vo/IP system for my office, and eGroupware with Cyrus for our mail system. We migrated from Microsoft Exchange some time ago and I've never looked back.

With eGroupware, we were able to replace 99% of the functionality of our Microsoft Exchange server with open source software. With sieve filters users can set up an unlimited number of server-side mail filters, something you can't do with Exchange anymore, and the web interface works much better with Firefox than Microsoft's web access. Our Asterisk phone system integrates into the mix and will deliver voicemail to the user's e-mail box.

Now, with my Blackberry I can download and play those voicemails without ever having to dial into the phone system, because they are wav files attached to e-mail that is picked up by my Blackberry. I'm feeling so "connected" right now it's not even funny :-)

Switching to an all open-source messaging suite like this was easier than I thought, but when we did the primary migration I only had about 10 users to worry about. This made it much easier. I took Outlook (or the appropriate mail client) and downloaded everything to a local storage. After setting up IMAP to the Cyrus server I pushed it all back up - not recommended if you're going to migrate a few hundred users, but effective in my case. I then set up the Funambol open source sync client for each user to sync their contacts and calendar between the server and their local store. This gives them remote access to their data, and I have a copy of that on both the desktop and the server in addition to the server backups in the event of a catastrophic failure.

On my Blackberry I again use the Funambol client to sync contacts and calendar to the server. Within 30 minutes of getting the Blackberry I'd already downloaded the Funambol client over the air and sync'd with my eGroupware server, without ever attaching the Blackberry to a computer.

Configuring Asterisk to deliver voicemails as a wav file to your e-mail box is simple. I now I have a completely integrated messaging system that doesn't tie me to a desktop computer, and every aspect of it is open source software!

I have to say I am impressed... I wish I could set all this up for us internally at Funambol ;-)

Sun and Funambol partner on Glassfish

Today Sun has announced a new partnership program around Glassfish, which is their open source Java application server (the only one that Marc Fleury once said "has managed to mount serious competition to JBoss"). Funambol is one of the partners in the program.

I am very pleased about the announcement because Sun came and asked us to join them, which I found flattering (I know, I have a thing for people asking me, when they are a million times bigger than us ;-)

I believe Funambol on Glassfish (and maybe OpenSolaris) could be a killer offering for enterprises. Any enterprise I know needs mobile email for all their employees. It can't be limited to BlackBerries for the CEO and sales people. Mobility is key to increase productivity (and make your employees workaholic ;-)

With Glassfish and Funambol Community Edition (powered underneath by the Sun open source MySQL database), you have a free and open solution that you can plug into your Exchange, Domino or open source email server (much better...). You do not have to pay anything and you have an enormous community to support you.

And if you need support from Funambol, we'll send you to one of our partners. As you know, we are not making money on enterprise deployments. We do not upsell our community. It is free as in free beer, unless you host it for consumers.

Sun is making all the right moves in open source. They have a very smart CEO and Simon Phipps, Chief of Open Source, a phenomenal individual. Add to it Marten Mickos, one of the brightest minds in open source and you might have a multi-billion open source company. I am definitely cheering for them.

Italy beats the rest of the world 2-1 (on iPhone)

I received this news today about "Dual Carriers for the iPhone in Italy". In a nutshell, Italy will have two carriers offering the iPhone, both TIM and Vodafone.

In a break from the company’s usual exclusive partner model, both Vodafone and Telecom Italia will be offering Apple’s iPhone in Italy.

Apple gave no details as to why it broke from its single carrier per market model; Telecom Italia announced it “has signed a deal with Apple to bring the iPhone to Italy later this year,” and Vodafone announced it would offer the popular handset in 10 countries, including Italy. In a statement, Vodafone said: “Later this year, Vodafone customers in Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa and Turkey will be able to purchase the iPhone for use on the Vodafone network.”

That's pretty odd, but it will mean more iPhones in Italy. I am ready to bet it is going to be a great success (despite not being a big hit on other countries in Europe).

It is all about fashion. And the iPhone is fashionable. Works in Italy.

JavaOne tomorrow: talk not to be missed

Tomorrow, our JavaME Tech Lead Edo Schepis will give a talk at JavaOne, which I believe it is going to be very interesting.

The title is "Funambol Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME Platform) Technology-Based Open-Source Messaging Client: Lessons Learned". It is part of the Technical Session and it is scheduled for Tuesday May 06 10:50 - 11:50 at Moscone Center - Esplanade 303 (Session ID TS-4992 for those picky).

The abstract is:

Three billion people own a mobile phone, yet only a small fraction use it for mobile email--why?

Until recently mobile email required high-end devices, costly service, and complex setup. But that is changing. Global mobile email usage is expected to grow 24 percent annually over the next four years, with explosive growth projected post-2008 due to rapid consumer email adoption. An open-source, standards-based, consumer push email solution is not just a benefit to developers. It also provides mobile operators, service providers, and online portals with broad device compatibility, low cost, ease of use, and the flexibility required to tap into the mass market.

This session guides attendees through the main lessons learned in developing the open-source Java™ Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME platform) technology-based messaging client based on Funambol synchronization software.

The session presents the following:
• Design and code samples of the Funambol Java ME technology-based SDK for synchronization
• Push technologies used for messaging and PIM notifications through SMS and TCP/IP channels
• Main issues discovered in Java ME technology-based implementations and workarounds to fix them
• Design and code samples of the Funambol Java ME technology-based messaging client
• How open source is contributing during the development and testing phases, solving the device fragmentation nightmare common in development on the Java ME platform
• How to handle carriers’/manufacturers’ security restrictions, using trusted applications such as the Java Verified Program and the certification process

The presentation places particular emphasis on the design choices used to blend object-oriented principles and developer community needs with the best user experience and performance.

At the end of the session, through code samples and lesson learned, the attendees will have a good understanding of
• How to build synchronization clients for Java ME technology-based devices, starting from the Funambol Java ME technology-based SDK
• What developers should know about building Java ME technology-based open-source messaging applications for the mass market

See you there!

Vodafone gives you free data with voice

A friend forwarded me an article about Vodafone UK bundling mobile data with their monthly data plan. In a nutshell, if you have a monthly plan (£7.50) you also get 500MB of free data.

That limit is "fair use" too, rather than capped - exceed it a few times and you'll get a warning, take the piss and they'll ask you to move onto a more expensive tariff.

This is huge news. 500 MB is a monthly limit that includes everything you do on a mobile phone, probably excluding videos. My average usage of the iPhone is about 200MB/month. But I do not do any YouTube videos over EDGE (it is so slow to be useless). I do lots of email, attachments, browsing, weather and maps. 500 MB is more than enough for me.

Free mobile data is the tipping point for Mobile 2.0. Once we get that, the ball will start rolling and it will be unstoppable. It is big news for any startup out there thinking about a mobile application around the carrier. Kudos to Vodafone to admit being a pipe is not that bad.

Mobile fund raising in the Valley

I can't consider myself an expert on fund raising, but I spent enough time driving up and down Sand Hill in all these years to have picked up a few signs. Last week, at the Sofcon conference, someone asked me to give suggestions to entrepreneurs, trying to raise money in the Valley with a mobile idea. I gave the following answers, thinking out loud as usual. Many people contacted me after the speech and asked me to put the ideas together in a post. Here it is.

1. NO CARRIERS. Forget the mobile operators. VCs have put enough money in companies that tried to sell to carriers and failed. They won't do it again. Your business model must go around the carrier. Be off-deck. Base it on the assumption that the carriers will become a dumb pipe. It is happening for real. This is the best time in the history of mobile to start a company doing mobile applications because the gateway is about to disappear. Build with the assumption that users will have a data plan and an IP on the phone. Sell to consumers, ISPs or Portals (and even Enterprises). Not carriers. VCs will listen.
2. GO IPHONE. I know Nokia has 40% of the mobile market, but there is no Nokia phone around here. Zip. If you have a mobile idea, show it on an iPhone. I know Nokia produces all the iPhones in the world today in four days. Still, we have none here. The iPhone is the cool device. VCs are starting to carry it around with their BlackBerry. If they don't, their wives and kids have an iPhone. Don't blame the VC. Investing early in a company is an emotional affair. It has very little to do with reality. You can't get emotional on something, if you can't try it or can't have anyone around you trying it. If you have to go super-consumer, go with a Motorola RAZR V3xx. But do not expect wows.
3. GO NOW. This is the right time. Do not wait a few months because money is getting tight. Mobile is super-hot. Cash is still out there. The financial crisis is going to dry out VC interest in early deals pretty fast. You have a good window before summer, with the launch of the iPhone competitors (pre-June) and the new iPhone (June). Buzz will be there. Your business plan might be slightly better in September but it might be too late. Do not wait...

An unlocked iPhone in the US?

The Apple buzz machine is starting to get going for the June launch of the 3G iPhone. Be ready to hear any possible rumor, from GPS support, an iPhone with a keyboard, a Mini iPhone, a Large iPhone (a laptop real replacement). Until Jobs shows up on stage, it will be just rumors.

One very interesting came up yesterday on Fortune. In a nutshell:

When the 3G iPhone is introduced this summer, AT&T, the exclusive U.S. iPhone sales partner with Apple, will cut the price by as much as $200, according to a person familiar with the strategy.

AT&T is preparing to subsidize $200 of the cost of a new iPhone, bringing the price down to $199 for customers who sign two-year contracts, the source says. Apple is expected to have two versions of the new iPhone, an 8-gigabyte-memory and a 16-gigabyte-memory model with price tags widely expected to be $399 and $499.

I have seen many reactions to this story, mostly linked to the low price of the device and the fact this will make sales explode for Apple.

One thing I haven't read (yet) but I feel it is the real story: if at&t subsidizes the phone to $199, why would I buy a $399 phone at the Apple Store? One and only reason: because it would be unlocked... A phone you can use with Tmobile and overseas.

It is not impossible, since Apple is doing it in Europe already (although the price of the unlocked phone is way higher than $399), but it is very strange. Everywhere we read that at&t had a lock (pun intended) on the iPhone in the US for five years. The story above calls at&t "the exclusive U.S. iPhone sales partner with Apple". If Apple comes up with an unlocked phone in the US after one year, than the lock was unlocked pretty fast. How exclusive is that?

Twitting about Twitter

Twitter is a very interesting phenomenon, that I have been following for a while now. It has a significant mobile component to it, so it fits my world. Actually, it is way more than just a mobile app. It is a mobile messaging app. And that's the space Funambol is in ;-)

Could Twitter be the answer to SMS?

I doubt it, but it is an interesting idea. SMS is about notifying people of events ("let's meet there") and having brief direct conversations ("what about lunch?"). Twitter is very similar. It is a notification engine (broadcast) and a point-to-point messaging platform (when you add @name).

What sets the two apart is the concept of following someone or being followed. Following someone means receiving every message that person sends out. This is where Twitter differentiates itself. It is a micro-blogging platform first, a messaging platform second.

And micro-blogging has its own problems. The number one issue, in my opinion, is what I call Twitter Diarrhea. It is an illness that attacks people that believe the world is really interested in everything they say. People that tweet every 10 minutes, tell you they are about to take a shower (like I care) and fill up your list of tweets in an hour.

The only defense against the disease is to stop following them. It is sad, because one of the 20 tweets is actually interesting. But when you have a "push" concept as in Twitter, message overload is a very significant challenge. In the last week, I stopped following at least five people I know well. Their interesting stuff / noise ratio was getting way too low.

When you move this into the mobile world, where you have limited real estate on screen and attention span (forget bandwidth, which is not a real issue with messaging), Twitter Diarrhea could actually be the outcome of a virus that infects the entire system, then tries to kill it.

It will be very interesting to see how the system reacts to it. And how it evolves to become a mobile messaging platform, if it will ever happen.

Are you an agile funambulist?

Our team in Pavia (Italy) is looking for an Agile Project Manager. It is a very cool job for someone who knows how to walk on a tight-rope and play foosball, all being very agile. We have been doing Agile Programming and SCRUM for a while now, and I have a feeling we are not going back to the old way...

Check if you have what it takes:

This position fills a key role in the company by establishing and managing an agile software development process.

Education and Experience
Various degrees of education and experience will be considered provided the applicant's experience demonstrates the following requirements:
* Bachelor of Computer Science or Engineering degree
* or more years experience in project management of coplex projects
* Excellent communication, fact discovery, and follow through skills.
* Experience in a commercial software development firm
* Experience with open source software
* Demonstrated leadership and implementation of company-wide initiatives, in particular with regard to the software development process
* Experience with managing releases for multiple titles on multiple concurrent platforms

Responsibilities
* Collecting input from engineering on feature implementations and development time
* Creating and maintaining the agile software development process.
* Reporting back project milestones to head of engineering and product management
* Identifying engineering issues that impact development and work with core product team (Product Management, Engineering, Quality Assurance) to resolve those issues.
* Providing feedback on development milestones
* Skills/Abilities/Knowledge/Personal Suitability
* Excellent understanding of the software development process (Tools and Techniques) , in particular agile development processes
* Solid understanding of SCRUM
* Solid understanding of Open Source Software Development
* Good Understanding of Software Quality Assurance Practices
* Basic Programming Knowledge (OOP, C++, Automation Scripting)
* Highly Focused on Continuous Improvement
* Able to work in and with a remoted team

If you feel you are the right candidate, please send us your resume at jobs@funambol.com.

AGPL for Ubuntu

Thanks to Matt, I found this article on the Register about Mark Shuttleworth, Canonical's chief executive. He has said AGPL is "a strong candidate" for the eventual open source release of Launchpad, Canonical's developer collaboration tool.

This would be a very nice push for AGPL. We need some brand (yep, Ubuntu is a brand, all developers know about it) pushing the license forward. Clearly, having Google behind it would be even better, but it is not happening (yet).

Let me try this: Chris (DiBona), can we agree on a number of AGPL projects in the Palamida Watch List to pass your "popular" bar? When is a license considered popular enough to be included in Google Code? Can we say 200 projects (we are at 68, up 20% since last week)?

Overall, I am already happy Mark Shuttleworth knows about AGPL. It means I made enough noise ;-) Let me hope he goes for it now....

More famous Mark, I am working hard, as you can see...

MySQL: hybrid is the way to go

As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the debate about the best open source business model is still open. We are done with licenses, finally. However, the question on how we make (more) money, while keeping our open source soul clean, is still there. And it might not go away soon...

Latest debate: MySQL alleged idea of having non-open source components in its Enterprise Edition. Whooo, scary...

Marten and Zack might have made a marketing mistake: leaking the news out at the end of their conference, where they did not talk about it, was probably not done on purpose... In particular, just after the Sun acquisition, with all eyes focused on how opensourcey they still are.

Nevertheless, this move is clearly into the right direction. The only way to make significant money and keep open source alive and kicking: an hybrid model with open source and proprietary components. My model involves also a separation of the open source community from the buyers community ("do not upsell your community"), but it is a model hard to pull off for MySQL, since they sell only to the enterprise... Anyway, that's a need for them, or as Marten wrote: "we believe we have to be more pragmatic than dogmatic. Call it a necessary evil if you like"...

I know Matt disagrees with me on this, but he is wrong (hey, he was convinced Arsenal would win the Premier League this year... It tells you something about his ability to predict things he cares about :-))

I can't believe a pure model based on support is going to scale to the one billion dollars we always talk about. A pure support and services model works for a while, then customers get comfortable with what they have and pull the plug on it. Your best customers leave you because they are too satisfied... It is sad but inevitable. Maybe you can make it with an operating system, but if you move up the stack you are screwed...

Bottom line: Marten and Zack are going in the right direction. Stop screaming about it. They are as opensourcey as you and me. But they need to keep open source (and their business) alive and kicking.

Quick guide on myFUNAMBOL and Windows Mobile

I bumped into an article on "Tech Tips for Us" where they talked about how to set up myFUNAMBOL to work with a Windows Mobile phone (a WM Smartphone, in the example).

I thought it was very well written, so if you have a Windows Mobile phone, check it out ;-)

Milking the GNU: Google to users

I just received the link to the "Google to users: you're not the boss of me now!" post on Milking the GNU and I found it too hilarious to ignore. Enjoy it...

Apple and the missing Task

One feature that is incredibly missing in the iPhone is Tasks. Every person I know has a task list. Most of us think about a task while they are on the move and need to write it down, or they will forget it (hey, it can't be only me, despite me getting older by the hour...).

Kincy just forwarded me a call to the WWDC conference, the Apple developer conference coming up in June.

The image on the ad is the following:


Now, what this shows is the Notes application of the iPhone used to add a Task...

You can read this in two ways:

1. The person who prepared the ad tried to find the Task application on the iPhone. Since it was not there, s/he decided to use Notes instead. Who cares about usability? This is Apple after all...
2. Apple is desperately in need of a developer who will write a Task application for the iPhone. The ad is a teaser for developers: "we left Tasks out so you can show the world how smart you are, come and develop it"
   

Either way, it is a smart ad...

Funambol Community Showcase #3: Google Android plug-in

Initially, I planned to have a Funambol Showcase per month, but I do not seem to be able to keep up with the load... Anyway, here is showcase #3, which is a very cool client built by Carlo, a very smart Funambol community member.

Funambol Android Plug-in

By Carlo Codega sazilla@gmail.com

Overview

The Funambol Android Plug-in is an Android application which enables you to sync personal data between a Funambol server (such as myFunambol portal) and Google Android, an open source mobile phone platform, based on a Linux OS and developed by the OHA (Open Handset Alliance).
The main objective of this project is to bring sync features on this new mobile platform. This should be the first application that you have to install on your Android phone for begin using it.

The Android SDK

The Google Team provided an SDK that you can use to develop your own Android application. It includes development and debugging tools, a set of libraries, a device emulator, sample projects, documentation, and more.
Currently the Android emulator includes a simple contacts manager, no calendar managers or email clients are provided. It means that, at least for now, the plugin provides the contacts sync feature only.

Why develop a sync application for Android?

The idea of the Android project was born concurrently with the announcement of this new mobile phone platform. Android is open source, Funambol is open source too. What should be first thing to do? Porting the Funambol sync software to Android using a slightly modified version of the JavaME Funambol API.
I started to develop for Funambol as a community member, with the Mozilla plugin, which became the object of my first level degree.
As soon as I saw the release of the first SDK, I’ve downloaded it and started working on it for verifying the possibility of porting the Funambol software over the Android platform. Now, since last December, I’m part of this project, that is included into the Code Sniper Program.

Interesting issues

After the announcement of this project, several interesting issues were born, regarding the cooperation of Funambol with Android to transform the mobile market. Funambol made available a position paper entitled: “How Google Android Stimulates the Mass Market for Mobile Email and how Funambol Mobile Open Source Monetizes It".
Some issues against Android.
I don’t like its user interface so much (I prefer the iPhone one), and I don’t see a big participation of the developers, at least not what I expected.
It still lacks an efficient bug reporting tool, a unique discussion group I think is not enough.

Using the Android Plugin

Few steps are needed to get the plug-in running on the Android emulator:
- Download the Android SDK.
- Download the Funambol Android Plug-in from Google Code.
- Install the Funambol Android Plug-in: run the emulator and install the application using the adb tool (run “adb install \Funambol-Client-.apk”).


- Run the application: go to the applications folder (All) and run Funambol.


The first step that is necessary for using the plug-in is to configure the communication settings. To do this go to Menu>Settings and set your preferences: username, password and the server url.


Now you can start to synchronize.

Future plans

Improve the contacts sync in terms of efficiency and reliability. Calendar/tasks sync and push email features will be added as soon as a stable email client and calendar/tasks manager will be provided. The Google Android PIM Plug-in is a community project, as such it can be developed and/or improved by anyone who participates to the Funambol Open Source Community, so please join our community and start to develop with us.

References

The project homepage is http://code.google.com/p/funambol. Here you can download the application package and different source code snapshots. The plugin and API sources are available on the Funambol forge, you can get it via CVS.

More feedback about Google and AGPL

Somehow, the discussion around Google and their stance against AGPL is generating quite a bit of discussions around the web. It is a juicy story, after all ;-)

The Register wrote an interesting article about how Google is starting to pay for banning AGPL. In particular, one of the very cool projects they have on Google Code - called Clipperz - has decided to abandon Google Code. Orangemesh (an open source dashboard server) is also in the process of moving.

The Register concluded:

Whatever its reasons, Google needs to get its house in order. ClipperZ is still listed on Google Code along with several other projects licensed under AGPL including Groups Wiki, shogiserver and the inactive Edozun7.

So, we are looking at a bunch of projects to be kicked out of Google Code. Not a problem for Google, they have tons of projects and they are happy to see them going.

Some disagree with Google, for example Bradley M. Kuhn who left this message on my blog:

I don't think Chris (DiBona) is being completely public about Google's full reasoning. The AGPL is a license that Google clearly dislikes for its own proprietary reasons — they have a vested corporate interest in impeding its popularity. I believe they are choosing not to allow AGPL'd code on their systems primarily for those reasons, and the “not popular enough” argument is a convenient excuse (now that they've lost their battle inside the OSI to block its approval).

It's disingenuous to compare licenses like the Nokia Public License to a license published by the FSF, which has a 25 year history of publishing licenses that do become popular over time, and also is opposed to license proliferation, and was so even back when OSI was in favor of proliferation. The FSF didn't write the AGPL just put its own stamp on a document which is otherwise nearly the same as other licenses (which is the common MO of license proliferation). AGPL is trying to address a completely new threat to the freedom of software users, and it happens to be a freedom that Google has a corporate interest in impeding.

The place where Chris and I agree wholeheartedly is that you shouldn't use code.google.com to host your FLOSS project. I recommend a host that will let you see all the source code of your hosting software, and build upon it, and not get locked in. SF.net is no better than google in this regard; I'd suggest Gna! or Savannah.

Huuuh, nice close ;-) Is Google pissing off the community a bit too much?

BlackBerry beating Twitter

On a more serious note, I found an interesting news today: RIM trying to stop Twitter from registering its trademark.

As you might now, I am a Twitter user. Micro-blogging sounds really stupid when you look at it, but it delivers interesting information. For example, when I land in a place and I tell people I am there, often my phone rings and I spend dinner with someone I know, rather than alone in a hotel room.

Then there is the use of Twitter to communicate with others. It is a form of Instant Messaging. But in a confuse way. And it has links to mobile (I use Twitter on my Windows Mobile or iPhone, depending what I am carrying at the time).

The fact that RIM sees Twitter as a competitor is a bit of a stretch to me. But I like the idea they are beating Twitter instead of retaliating against me :-)

Beating BlackBerry

I had the opportunity to physically beat BlackBerry at CTIA. It was the opportunity that presents itself once in a lifetime, I had to do it.


Rony also shot a video of it, available below.



I am not proud of what I have done.

AGPL v3 to be added to Palamida Watch List

Palamida is tracking adoption of GPL v3 on a special blog. The last post mentioned an incredible rate of adoption for it. There are already more than 2,000 projects using the license (or a variation of it, like LGPL v3), with a good chance to reach 5,000 by the end of the year. I feel we are about to reach the tipping point, when everyone will move from GPL v2 to v3.

In parallel, Palamida has decided to track AGPL adoption. There are already 42 projects using it, even if it has just been approved by the OSI. And even if Google says they won't host any AGPL project on their site, because "there are plenty of other hosts out there that are happy to serve you"...

I am looking forward to tracking AGPL growth. It might initially be a niche, because only people developing software to run as a service will get it. But with SaaS getting traction, it is going to grow really fast down the road. I actually have a bet with Mark Radcliffe that in five years AGPL will overtake GPL. Now we have a way to track it...

I know, I am going to lose the bet with Mark, but I just won the March Madness game in the office, so I am already up one... I can take it.

Time to kill CTIA

I just came back from CTIA in Vegas, where Funambol was an exhibitor. I have been going to that show for years. I loved it when it was in New Orleans, then they moved it to Vegas (and I liked it a little less), then Orlando (and I liked it a lot less), then Vegas again.

This year, I reached the conclusion that it is time to kill the show. Look around: how many announcement have been made this week? I mean, significant ones?

ZERO

Sprint launching an iPhone clone (yawn), Microsoft saying their browser will be the best in the market (yawn) and Nokia showing a tablet with Wi-Max (interesting, but a micro-niche, so yawn). Anything else? Nope. Nada. That's it...

What about attendance? Well, I found parking few steps from the main entrance. Beside the crowd at opening, lunch and around Starbucks, it was nearly dead. No signs of crowd in casinos as well. Many many booths and many many dollars invested, but not that much business. ROI very low.

The reason, in my opinion, is 3GSM-MWC in Barcelona. That show is sucking CTIA dry. Every announcement is there. Everybody goes there. Why going to CTIA a month later? No reason, unless you are European and want to gamble with your Euros...

Bottom line: it is time to kill CTIA. At least the spring show. I believe the September show has a lot of potential (we are missing a big wireless show in the second half of the year). If I were CTIA, I would put all my eggs in one basket and focus only on that show.

Ok, that was funny...

Our creative marketing department came up with an interesting idea today. Unfortunately, it was just an April Fools' joke...

Google blocking AGPL in Google Code

I received an email this morning from a friend who is planning to put his open source project in Google Code, the open source repository hosted by Google.

He is concerned by this thread in Google groups. A developer asked, back in November:

Can I host a project on Google's Project Hosting, if it's licensed under AGPL? It's one of FSF's licenses. I really need AGPL instead of GPL, as my project is a server-side software.

Chris DiBona, Google master of open source, answered:

In fact we do not support the AGPL on code.google.com. We are actively trying to fight the proliferation of licenses that are considered open source and the AGPL both has very little market share and has not been certified as being open source by the OSI.

Now, that was November 2007... Later in the thread Chris writes:

We have no current plans to do so. If AGPL adoption is high enough to warrant it, we'll revisit. The question is this: Who will propose the AGPL to the OSI? :-)

Nice :-) Funambol did it. AGPL is OSI approved. When pushed again, Chris switched from AGPL not being OSI-approved to not being a popular license:

what really matters is that the license is adopted. So far, we haven't seen much of it.

So, first AGPL was not good enough for Google because it was not OSI-approved. That limited its popularity... Now it is OSI-approved. Still, it is not popular enough to be accepted in the Google closed open source hosting site?

And, by the way, why should people put their open source code in the hands of someone who likes open source only when it does good to its business (ehm, that could include me, but we are not talking about me, are we ;-) ?

C'mon Chris, give developers the ability of using AGPL for their own projects in Google Code. Your fight for no proliferation of licenses is something I subscribe to, but AGPL is the license of the future, no matter if Google likes it or not. And I can guarantee you it will become even more popular if it is accepted in Google Code...

Tmobile: when the pipe becomes too dumb

As you might know, I believe mobile operators are all destined to become pipes. They are a voice pipe today, after all, and they will be a data pipe shortly as well. They simply do not own content or any user content. The content owner will deliver the services, not the operators.

One example is in mobile email. Everyone thought the carrier would win, because they are the gate keeper. Wrong. The gate is not between you and your email provider. The gate is in the hands of your email provider. They have the content (your email). They can decide not to serve it to the mobile operator (or gouge them for it). Eventually, market forces will push mobile operators towards open data plans, and the power will shift to email providers (ISPs and portals).

Some days, however, I get surprised how a potential dumb pipe can become too dumb. In the last few days, we started getting reports that syncs on Tmobile stopped working. From people that bought a data plan. Same phone with an at&t SIM card worked. Put a Tmobile SIM card in and it would not work (actually, it was worst, sync with native SyncML clients were giving false positives...).

After some analysis, we found the issue. All of a sudden, Tmobile is chopping off the word jsessionid from the URLs. That is what native SyncML clients use to keep track of the session. If you chop it off, the sync can't work.

Now, there are two options:

1. they did it on purpose, to block some application they do not like. Certainly it is not sync, but I just can't see what it could be (Google and Yahoo apps work... They are the enemy, right?)
2. they did it by mistake, putting in the network a new gateway that has a bug or a feature they did not know about

I do not like conspiracy theories and I have been around mobile operators enough to believe option #2 is the right one. We spent three hours on the phone with Tmobile just to hear that "they do not support third party application", so they could do nothing for us. Bottom line: I believe they made a mistake, which will be fixed sooner or later.

If this is the case, we are facing a case of a dumb pipe which is a bit too dumb. That is a scary thought... Let me count on market forces to fix it. It always works like this...

Funambol in my car

Yesterday, Dash finally launched its device. The first feedback from Walt Mossberg at the WSJ has been "I like it a lot". I can't agree more...

What is Dash Express? It is a car navigator. A device you put in your car and gives you directions. Ok, I know you might have one already. But this is different. Dash Express is connected to the net. Via GPRS or wifi (if you have an hotspot around, e.g. in your house when your car is parked).

Being connected to the net has few major advantages:

1. every car tells the Dash system where it is and how fast is going. That gives them an incredible accuracy on knowing how the traffic is doing and giving you suggestions on where to go to avoid jams. Choosing 280 over 101 can save you hours in Silicon Valley...
   
2. you can browse for places to go to in the car, directly searching in Yahoo Local (which has every possible place you want to go to). You are not limited by the old and out-of-date CD database.
3. you can highlight an address on your browser (when you are in front of your computer) and send it to your car. Once you get in the car, the address is there and you can just follow the instructions to get to your destination.
4. the device updates itself over-the-air, including maps and features and bug fixes.

I have been a beta user of Dash Express. I received my first unit at the end of 2006, over a year ago. That device had an external GPS antenna and some quirks in the navigation: for example, it gave me instructions to go into a road, violating the traffic code, or suggested me a never ending loop to go home ;-) Now it is bug-free and pretty much perfect.

Actually, it just became a dream for me. I developed an integration with myFUNAMBOL, which now pushes to the device my calendar events. That is, if I put an appointment on my Outlook and I add the location in it, it shows up in the car. I mean, I get in the car and I have all my appointments there. One click and I get routed to the place (with the fastest route, avoiding traffic jams). No worries.

The way I got addicted to Dash + Funambol Calendar sync equals my addiction to TiVo. I do not believe I found a device that changed my life as TiVo did, giving me back my freedom. Time is the most precious thing I have. TiVo saves it. Dash is very very close to it. I do not think I could live without it now...

We are demoing the calendar sync on the Dash Express at CTIA next week in Vegas. If you want to take a look, stop by our booth (#3800). We are making this available to the myFUNAMBOL public - for free and open source as usual - in a couple of weeks. Ahh, and if you just can't wait, just go and buy your Dash Express today. They sell it on Amazon as well.

451 on AGPL

Jay Layman of the 451 group wrote a post on AGPL, which I found quite interesting (I am biased, of course ;-)

His question is if AGPL is half empty or half full. In particular, he wrote:

Google’s license choices and glass-half-empty approach may end up costing the vendor some of its dominance in the future

This ties nicely with my suggested business model for the future... I believe Google should rethink its strategy around open source, be more open and gain from the power of a community, also for its core.

Jay adds:

Similar to how open source software has historically been among the only effective weapons to fight market and monopoly powers such as Microsoft, the AGPLv3 may elevate the more collaborative, more transparent and productive communities above those that continue to leverage old GPL loopholes. In other words, there are more advantages to GPL-style collaboration, community and cachet (glass half-full) than there are disadvantages to having to share code.

Can't agree more :-)

The (open source) business model

These are the days of OSBC in San Francisco. A conference that is still quite valid and interesting, despite open source being now everywhere. My hope is that we are done with talking about licenses (enough, we have GPL and AGPL v3, that's all we need) and we'll focus on business models. Here, I am not sure we are done.

I have been thinking a lot about it lately (maybe because I was on a beach on vacation...) and I came to the conclusion that, eventually, there will be one prevalent business model around open source. I am not talking 2009, maybe 2015.

I have never been a fan of business plans based on support or consulting or professional services. They do not scale. Good to make a living (a very respectable thing, do not get me wrong), not to build a billion dollar company. Licensing it the answer for hyper-growth.

Now, with the world moving towards Software as a Service (SaaS), and everything being fed through the Net, how do you make it all work?

First, you need open source. There is no question about it.

Second, you need a market for your open source product. Where you will not make money. But that will give you all the benefits of a big community. That market - in my opinion - is the enterprise. Not every enterprise, those companies that value the source code in open source. That want to touch it. Those that want to deploy open source in house. To them, you give your software for free. You do not make money. It is your community. You do not upsell to them.

Third, If someone is hosting your software, they pay. You "license" the code to them. The end user might still be an enterprise, who has pushed that application in outsourcing. That is, enterprise that use SaaS software pay for it, even if it is originally open source. They won't see the code or touch it, but they do not want to do it. That's why they chose outsourcing. You can be the hoster or you can sell to hosters (your call).

Fourth, If the end user does not want to pay, you subsidize the price with advertising. The SaaS offering will be free, but you will make money anyway.

That's it. Simple as it goes.

Who is doing it? Well, Funambol is... That was too easy :-)

What about SugarCRM? They are close to this model. They have Sugar On-Demand. They could change the license, dump all the features in the community edition for deployments within the enterprise, and focus entirely on their hosting business. Maybe they will, one day... I would be curious to check with John how the revenue split is today and what the trend is (I might actually do it tomorrow on the boat ;-)

What about others, non-open source company? How different is Google from hosted open source with advertising? Should they just open source the code they have built so that people could deploy it in house, protecting it with AGPL? Why not? What about Salesforce.com? Why not do the same? Why protecting your code if you can defend it from competitors and get the advance of having a community working with you?

I am really curious to see how this will play out. And to listen to what people say at OSBC. BTW, I am speaking there at 2 pm on Wednesday, the panel is "Out of the Server, Into the Network" chaired by the mythical Larry Augustin. If you are around, give me a holler.

Iphone vs. Android

Today at AJAXWorld 2008 in New York, Andrea Gazzaniga (our own Software Developer Manager at Funambol) delivered a very interesting talk about "developing Open Source Mobile Messaging and Sync Apps for iPhone vs. Android".

The topic is quite hot. Apple just released the iPhone SDK and Android has been around for enough time for developers to figure it out. Not completely (for both), but enough to have a few ideas. And to get pissed at some choices, in particular on the Apple side ;-)

The Funambol community built on both platforms, so Gazza is one of the few on the planet that can talk about both with competence. I have my opinions, that might differ from his ;-)

Let me start with Android: it is OPEN. I like it. I feel Google is trying to re-design a developer paradigm, which is a big risk. If they succeed (it depends on devices being sold, not developers...) then they might have a lock in the operating system of the next 20 years. Yep, Android spans from mobile phones to many other devices. In my view, it might go back to sub-notebooks, which are the desktop of the future (and near present). That is, everything that is not a server. Not a small piece of the market.

The iPhone SDK is a real disappointment. Sometimes, I feel we should have kept the world split between those that get it (and have a jailbroken phone) and those that don't (and are happy with a browser). The SDK - as it is today - is an half-assed effort (pardon my French). It is just too limited, too full of traps, to be really useful. And gives the false idea of an open platform.

Take our push email and PIM sync client. Apple announced ActiveSync support. Nice, that means an integration from Exchange to the native email, calendar and contacts (I assume). So you would think you can do the same with the SDK.

Wrong.

First, there is no calendar API. What? Nope, no calendar API. No way to interact with calendar. But they do it with ActiveSync. It is a private API. Not an open API...

Second, there is no email API. OK, I was expecting this, but it still bothers me. Same as above.

Third, there is no way to do push, since the application die when they are closed (e.g. when your phone rings). You cannot fire an application in the background... You cannot notify the phone where there is a new email. Very useful.

Fourth, you cannot talk about the SDK. You must sign an NDA to download the SDK. What?? An open SDK I cannot talk about? What is in the word open that Apple does not get?

Fifth, there are "rules" that Apple will enforce. One is that you cannot run an application that is capable of executing code, which is not Objective-C. That means, no Java Virtual Machine (despite Sun saying they wanted to do it... ooops, bad marketing attempt) and no Flash (although Adobe just said the same).

Sixth (but there is more), no developer - that I know - has been accepted in the program to "sign" applications for inclusion in the Apple Store. Everyone was rejected. How are people going to spend time to develop apps that might never get into the Apple Store, since the developer does not have the ability to sign them??

Bottom line: Android is good and open. The iPhone SDK is crap and closed. We'll build on both for now, but Apple needs to get a grip on openness or we will all move to Android. You do not screw up with developers too much. They are easy to get upset and do not like to be pushed around. Apple be warned.

AGPL is OSI approved. Sweet victory.

I just found out that the OSI (Open Source Initiative, the stewards of the Open Source Definition (OSD) and the community-recognized body for reviewing and approving licenses as OSD-conformant) has approved AGPL v3.

Yay!!

For those who don't follow this blog (hey, why are you reading it now, then? ;-) the fight against the ASP loophole in GPL has been one of my long-standing battles. In GPL v2, those who ran open source software in a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) environment, and modified the open source code, were not required to return the changes back to the community (just because of a technicality, since the clause of copyleft applied to physical distribution of the software, not distribution of software as a service). For me, this has always been one of the worst risks for open source oblivion. If you can take and you do not give back, defeating the copyleft concept, you kill open source. The ASP loophole is the cancer of open source.

One company benefiting from it is Google, abusing open source software for their benefit (aren't you interested in seeing the modification to the Linux file system they did to run their gazillion of servers? I am ;-) In fact, they pushed for the ASP loophole to be ratified in GPL v3 and they submitted it to OSI for approval. They love the loophole. They made a business around it (and what a business!!). They got GPL v3 OSI approved...

Funambol submitted AGPL v3 to OSI. AGPL is the exact same as GPL v3, with a sentence that closes the ASP loophole. If you run AGPL code as a service, you need to return the changes to the community. Distribution of software as a service is distribution of software. Simple as that.

Google wasn't thrilled, obviously. Chris DiBona, the Open Source Programs Manager at Google recently wrote on the discussion list that AGPL needed improvements... Although I understand why he would say so ;-) I strongly disagree, so did the OSI and Eben Moglen with the FSF.

Eben wrote:

“AGPLv3 is a useful tool for developers of, for example, web applications who are seeking to ensure perpetual respect for end-users’ freedoms. SFLC believes there are many development projects that would benefit from considering the use of AGPLv3, and we welcome the OSI’s decision“

Amen. AGPL v3 is here. It is OSI approved. The fight is over. Sweet victory. The loophole is closed forever. Let's open some Italian spumante.

Now we just need developers to understand that using GPL v3 instead of AGPL v3 is just dumb. Your software is going to be used as a service, if not today, in a few years. Yes, YOUR software. Everything is going to be used as a service, even word processors... They can take it and do not give any changes back to your community. Wavemaker is smart and they are now using AGPL. Many will follow.

Don't be dumb, give it an A.

Open Source in Mobile - tomorrow

I just got back from a quick European trip and I will be speaking tomorrow at the Open Source in Mobile (OSiM) conference in San Francisco.

I am chairing a panel at 2:15 pm and the title is "The Importance of Open Source Software in Mobile 2.0".

Topics:

* What is Mobile 2.0?
* The transition from Mobile 1.0 to Mobile 2.0
* What Mobile 2.0 means for users and all parts of the ecosystem

Panelists:

Thomas Jakob, Vice President, Innovation, Swisscom
Tony Wasserman, Executive Director, Center for Open Source Investigation, Carnegie Mellon West
Roberto Galoppini, Commercial Open Source Expert and Consultant for Microsoft

If you are at the conference (you might, this blog is Mobile Open Source and the conference is Open Source in Mobile ;-) I look forward to talking to you.

Richard Boly for President

Richard Boly is, in my opinion, the person that has done more for young Italian entrepreneurs than any Italian politician. He happens not to be Italian, just passing by. But he is leaving a mark that will last.

I found this interview on the web today, that describes his work pushing a US mentality in my native country. Something we desperately need and that I am trying to inject there every day (everyone must have a pet project and a long-term goal...).

Richard does everything with passion (including discussing with me about baseball, although we disagree on the best team) and he has been involved in almost any smart initiative in the last few years...

I am not sure if he wants to run for President here (the race seems a bit too tight), but I am definitely ready to support him if he runs for President in Italy (the race seems wide open).

He is just what Italy needs.

SDForum about building communities (tonight)

For those who live in the Valley, I am speaking tonight at the SDForum Open Source SIG. The topic is "Building Vibrant & Sustainable Communities". You just have to show up at the door, if you are interested (and it is only $15).

The panel includes me and John Mark Walker, who is the Community Manager of Hyperic. I saw his slides beforehand and they are awesome. You should not miss the opportunity to listen to him (I am optional).

What: SDForum Open Soruce SIG: "Building Vibrant & Sustainable Communities"

Where: DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary LLP. 2000 University Avenue (note: These are the tall buildings on the corner of University Ave. and Woodland, west of Hwy. 101) East Palo Alto

Description:

Building a healthy and productive open source community is essential for the success of any open source project or business.

Topics will include strategy for building a cohesive community, continuously creating value to members, managing communities effectively, and real world examples of success and failures. The format for these well-timed subjects will be both presentation and open forum so everyone will have a chance to participate, ask questions and provide answers. This is a wonderful opportunity to get expert insight on one of the most important aspects of successful open source…building strong and effective communities.

Agenda:

6:30 - 7:00 p.m. Registration/Networking
7:00 - 8:30 p.m. Presentation

How much: $15.00 for non-SDForum members and free for SDForum members

Using Funambol on iPod Touch

While you wait for the support of ActiveSync on the iPhone (and wonder why you still are not using Microsoft Exchange...), I would recommend you take a look at this post about using Funambol and the iPod Touch, having a PC with Fedora and Evolution (good choice, tough but good).

Note: if you do not use Fedora and Evolution, but Windows with Outlook, you can skip pretty much everything and just install the Funambol client from the Installer on your iPod Touch (under Productivity) and the Funambol Outlook Plugin.

The iPhone SDK is coming with ActiveSync

So, we finally have a date: March 6th. The iPhone will have an open SDK and a new era in mobile development will start.

Actually, Apple said that they will talk about the roadmap on March 6th, at a town-hall event, not that they will release the code (or the tools to get apps certified and on the phone). However, being late already (Steve Jobs said "end of February" last time he talked about it), I would be extremely surprised if they do not release the SDK...

I am curious to see how many hoops they will force developers to go through, to get the apps certified. And if you will be able to install them only via iTunes on the PC or also over-the-air (they now have OTA iTunes, so it should be a no brainer...).

The interesting twist is that they also announced "some exciting new enterprise features" at the same event.

What can that be? May I bet?

Mobile email with Exchange. With Microsoft ActiveSync support native on the iPhone.

The interesting thing will be to see how they manage the battery issue. The iPhone is not great at that and ActiveSync is meant for sucking your battery dry. Oh well, Apple will always be able to blame Microsoft for that ;-)

(Mobile) Document Freedom Day

March 26 will be Document Freedom Day. Cool idea, what is it?

the Document Freedom Day will provide a global rallying point for Document Liberation and Open Standards. It will literally give teams around the world the chance to "hoist the flag"

At Funambol, we'll hoist the flag for mobile standards. If there is a market where open is just at its beginning, it is wireless. It is getting there, but we need to keep pushing.

On March 26 we will celebrate SyncML, against everything else in the market (ActiveSync, the BlackBerry protocols and much more). Let's open this market up! Go open synchronization and push email ;-)