Re: building the "next generation" library catalog

Both Eric's email and Jonathan's response
contrasts "commercial" with "open
source."  Happily, this is not really
necessary--or for that matter, even logical.
Commercial refers to a type of company.  A
commercial product or service is one that is
produced by a for-profit company.  Open source
refers to the type of license by which software
is distributed, and has nothing to do with
whether the software is distributed by a
commercial company, an individual, a non-profit company, etc.

I am not just splitting hairs by pointing this
out.  Much of the discussion of open source
software for libraries has hidden assumptions
that are not examined and that are not true.

There are commercial companies that develop
software and distributed it under an open source
license.  Those companies also offer ongoing
support, as well as installation services,
customization services, and sponsored development.

In reality there is no need to choose between
having a commercial company to rely on and being
able to utilize open source software, with all of
its attendant advantages.  You can have the best
of both worlds by working with commercial
companies that distribute and support open source library software.