Ideas - Tuesday, July 31, 2007 19:22 - 2 Comments

So what is the future of software?

(If I knew, I’d sell it for $24.95!) Seriously, Om Makik’s GigaOM - a well respected, influential site in the technosphere - has kicked off a month long “micro site” on the Future of Software that it will conclude in a handy .pdf format with an executive summary, no doubt.

I really wanted to like this series, I did. But the lead post, The Seven Cs of Software, in my opinion, warms over shopworn and weary platitudes and Conventional Wisdom into a very unappetizing dish. For example:

Collective, while still privileging the individual. The best software of the future will bring together the work and goals of many people without subordinating each person’s knowledge and expertise to the dominance of the group, as happens with group think.

What’s needed is a definition of the future of software that has a bit more zing, a bit more bite. Here’s my rebuttal: the Seven Ms of Software:

• Microsoft. Love it, hate it; doesn’t matter. Microsoft is not going away despite all the uber-cool web apps in the world. That means opportunity and peril for other software companies. Elephants aren’t necessarily dangerous to mice, so long as the mice keep a sharp eye on them.
• Mobile. Not just on phones now that iPhone has redefined what a cell phone is, but on my work desktop, my home desktop, my buddy’s desktop when I’m over there. I want my information where I am - and securely - if you please.
• Mindful. The age of insolent software and subservient “users” is drawing to an end - people want software that goes the extra mile to accommodate their needs, their desires, their lifestyles - without 10-tab property dialogs, if you please.
• Multiplatform. Apple’s marketshare is up. I run Vista on my MacBook Pro every day, virtualized XP on my Vista box every day, Firefox across all of them. The neat little walled cities of Mac people over there, Window People over there and everyone else hiding in caves is so 20th century.
• MicroMarket. Industrial-sized markets are splintering faster than you can say YouTube and people’s tolerance for “one size fits all or else” software is diminishing. No one wants - or will long accept - using ill-suited general tools to fulfill needs when finding the right tool is a Google click away.
• MicroISV (You knew this was coming, right? :)) The economics of the Internet are the economics of microISVs - one to a few developers building products that work the way they think they should, connecting to a global distributed market via the Net. Will the VC funded startups still get the press? Yes - reporters are attracted to bright lights and big noises. But make no mistake: the age of microISVs is just starting to come into it’s own.