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 COLUMN
America in dire straits is the best opportunity for free software I HAVE A theory that the free software movement will flourish during George W. Bush's presidency. Bush is on the right track bypushing for a tax cut. Hopefully he will get it and continue to encourage Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan to reduce interest rates. Although reduced interest rates and a tax cut will stimulate the economy, the effects won't be immediate. I believe it takes one year to four years for most economic policies to produce tangible results.
It will take time to correct these errors. The Bush administration can't pump oil out of U.S. soil overnight. Nor can reduced interest rates or a tax cut immediately restore the stock market to its meteoric heights. It will be at least a year and perhaps longer before we see the economy start to recover fully. How quickly it regains momentum after that is anyone's guess. Indeed, economic recovery in the next four years can't be guaranteed, especially if Bush's economic strategies are blocked in Congress or if the national debt gets out of hand once again. If you think I'm being overly pessimistic, consider two economic wild cards: Japan and the Middle East. Japan's economic problems could easily affect us. Japan has invested heavily in American companies and real estate. If its economy continues to tank, investors may be tempted to liquidate their holdings in American properties. And if the Middle East erupts into a full-scale war, all bets on predicting future oil prices are off. Now for the good news: A slow economy does not negate the fact that the Internet economy still represents the greatest business opportunities for the next few decades. If they're smart, the next round of dot-coms will be thriftier. Likewise, IT departments will have to shrink their budgets in spite of the fact that the demands on them may remain stable or increase. These folks must watch every penny, from development costs to the deployment and management of hardware and software. Enter open source, BSD, and Linux. No matter what Sun and Microsoft tell you, it is infinitely less expensive to build your infrastructure around open source. In the past, a conservative CIO or CTO would be reluctant to spend $59 on Linux instead of $50,000 on Windows 2000, simply because nobody ever got fired for buying Microsoft. But in a tight economy, that same CIO or CTO can become a hero for saving the company tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars by taking such risks. Although I have confidence that Bush can turn the economy around, he cannot do it quickly. In the meantime, we'll be stuck with tight IT budgets. That may be bad news for investors, but it's good news for open source. Because an America in financial straits is truly the land of opportunity for free software. Return to In-Depth: IT Policy Nicholas Petreley is founding editor of LinuxWorld ( www.linuxworld.com ). Reach him at nicholas@petreley.com.  RELATED SUBJECTS  Software DevelopmentWeb TechnologiesDiscuss this article in our online forums MORE > SPONSORED WHITE PAPERS 
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