Open source software benefits are great especially considering the initial investment of the software procurement. Sure there are challengers of open source software offering enterprise support services and cost benefit analysis proving value of a commercial product. Does open source software still have value in cloud computing environments and utility computing infrastructures?

Open source software provides support from large groups of internet developers that in some cases are larger than commercial software vendors. Advantages for larger and growing open source developer groups for products also include quick problem resolution at zero cost. In most cases just post a question on an open source developer board and recieve a response within minutes. Please note the quality of the response can vary.

A few months ago the open source guru said cloud computing is "Worse Than Stupidity" [link]. The value for open source software is deminishing with utility computing and cloud computing since services are hosted in software vendor data centers rather than on premise. There is no need for IT departments to download and maintain open source software with cloud computing and utility computing.

For me Utility Computing offers an opprotunity for developers as well as small businesses to consume and develop high value utilty computing services at an affordable cost. Examples for this include healthcare providers, governments and low income communities to access high quaility medical utility computing processes at an affordable cost.

Just my 2 cents.

JM