Technology and Social Action - Thinking of buying photo-editing software? Don't - Comments

Web services vs local free software

Paula Graham — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 13:43:37 +0000

Agree, this is exactly what the Hub should be doing, but won't. The Hub doesn't want to fund stuff which will require ongoing revenue funding but wants to set up self-sustaining networks and knowledge bases blah blah. In short, they want to throw some seed dosh at it over a short period and expect NOT to have to spend anything on actually developing service infrastructure.

What small orgs want is applications they don't have to maintain themselves (whether locally installed and remotely maintained or remotely hosted) -- and that's exactly what small orgs aren't going to get because it would involve providing revenue-funded services which is exactly what a neo-liberal government wishes to avoid.

If there's any way of funding it, the provision of either remotely-hosted apps or an 'outsourced' (remote-access) maintenance service is what SMO's actually WANT.

Agree, apps can be provided appropriate to bandwidth but what orgs want to do doesn't always mesh with what their connection will support.

Annalee Newitz on web tools

Paula Graham — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 17:34:22 +0000

http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/48883/

Horses for courses

AndyDearden — Mon, 21 May 2007 15:06:49 +0000

Surely the issue is what kind of software on what kind of bandwidth. Image editing using a network will involve high bandwidth exchanges.

Text document editing using web services is nothing like as bandwidth hungry.

I've been talking to some folks in Sheffield about the potential for local voluntary sector infrastructure organisations to provide this kind of service to smaller organisations in the area.

Perhaps this is what the ICT Hub should be offering? This could be managed with a slightly better deal on intellectual 'property' than we strike with Google.

And this could all be done with Open Source tools providing those services.

Learning Curve

Steve Thompson — Sat, 19 May 2007 18:29:00 +0000

There is a way round that GIMP learning curve if you are used to Photoshop -- Gimpshop http://gimpshop.blogspot.com/ has hacked teh GIMP interface to more closely resemble Photoshop

Web services vs local free software

Paula Graham — Sat, 19 May 2007 09:15:21 +0000

Agree, all very well if you can access the remote servers 24/7 -- there are also issues about the providers of web-based software. I do use Google's stuff for example, but I'm concerned about storing anything sensitive on remote servers -- particularly in the USA where the government is prone to demand mass access to the public's electronic trails.

There's also the problem that you may not understand the contracts you're getting into -- that services you've become dependent on as free services might decide to charge, go bust, be discontinued or just flakey. Delicious, for example, used to have a habit of going frustratingly offline for a while and its backup facility wasn't working for a fair stretch at one time.

I also suspect that the kind of small org this is aimed at wouldn't have a clue how to backup their delicious xml bookmarks (took me 20 mins of research and fiddling to figure it out)? Or synch their Google calendar (and that would mean local software) even if they can manage to figure out how to backup their GoogleDocs?

And, as I've commented elsewhere, decent bandwidth connections aren't cheap. Most people are footling along on some crappy 2-meg connection with a contention ratio of anything up to 100:1. Good luck with using remote software on that at tea-time!

Agree with Eric, free software is the way to go. I like Irfanview, I used it for years. Lately, it's started trying to bung toolbars etc on as part of its installation. You have to opt-out -- again, a challenge for the less experienced user. On the other hand, Irfanview is bog-simple, and, I think, an excellent choice overall for inexperienced users.

For people who want more bang and don't mind a learning curve, Gimp is available for Windows and Linux (and Mac if you don't mind messing about with gtk+ runtime installation which, I gather, is a pain for the less experienced Mac user). It's very easy on Windows and is offered on the Gimp-for-Win download page: http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html

Achilles heel

Eric Lee — Fri, 18 May 2007 08:07:10 +0000

This was an interesting study and I do think that web-based software is interesting. But ... what happens when you leave the comfort zone of your wi-fi enabled office?

Free web services

David Wilcox — Thu, 17 May 2007 10:32:33 +0000

Eric - you might be interested in the experiment Miles Maier did in using free web services instead of desktop software. I think it can be a great route for nonprofits generally.

Thinking of buying photo-editing software? Don't

Eric Lee — Wed, 16 May 2007 13:20:18 +0000

Two things are happening to software that should be of interest to trade unionists. First, software that used to cost a great deal of money is now often available completely free of charge. Second, that software – which used to come on CD-ROMs – now is often available for use online, through your web browser.