More on pyMOL
Posted: March 7th, 2009 | Author: Matt | Filed under: Bioinformatics | Tags: Bioinformatics, pymol, visualization | 2 Comments »The people from pyMOL responded to my last post, where I made a comment that DeLano is “heavily trying to commercialize” pyMOL. I felt I should write a little more on that.
Firstly, I wasn’t really passing judgement. There’s nothing wrong with commercial software, I’ve written enough of that myself. Nor is there anything wrong with soliciting contributions to open source software projects, especially when they’re as good as pyMOL. However, looking at the pyMOL website and download page, it seems that DeLano Sc. is trying to create the impression that a subscription is necessary. There’s a list of commercially available builds and bunch of ways to get inferior or education-only versions. The source download is right there at the bottom, but I somehow missed that when I first went to the site and I know of at least two other people who where also confused. All the options are obvious now, but it is a bit misleading for a first-time user.
I guess it’s the old problem of how to get people to contribute to open source project, and the approach is much like MySQL’s. I’m not sure how useful it is, though. A student using pyMOL once or twice for assignments is not going to pay for it anyway. Any researcher or institution, OTOH, will learn quickly that there’s a OSS version available. They’re used to open source, so there shouldn’t be much corporate red tape that can be avoided with buying commercially, nor will they afraid of compiling it themselves or require much support. The actual value of a subscription is therefore quite low, and many will just choose to pay to support the project.
There is, then, not much use in misleading people into thinking the OSS version is inferior, or hiding it below a long list of commercial options. There’s nothing wrong with asking people for a little goodwill, and many will happily do so especially when it’s not their own budget. I just wished DeLano where a bit more open about it.
Update: the response by pyMOL below is worth reading.
The key thing to recognize is that while PyMOL is an open source project, it isn’t *only* an open-source project: it is also a successful software & services business which has enabled the PyMOL software development component to be economically self-sufficient for several years now. Very few open-source projects can claim such self-sufficiency — most depend entirely on part-time volunteer development effort.
Nevertheless, there always will be conflicts and tension between purely free open-source efforts, which are sustained entirely through volunteerism, and sustainable open-source businesses, which grow through self-reinforcing value exchange cycles (more money, more value; even more money, even more value; etc.). Yes, DeLano Scientific faces tough challenges balancing these two orthogonal perspectives, but everyone who uses any form of PyMOL should understand that the software would not be anything like what it is today were it not for the recurring contributions of PyMOL’s many sponsors over the past six years. For a direct comparison with “pure” open-source efforts, look at OpenRasMol or Jmol. They are good, but they cannot match PyMOL’s graphics.
Thus, it does not make sense to complain about DeLano Scientific doing what all businesses do in terms of marketing its products (i.e. current executable with extra featurues and documentation) and services (i.e. maintenance, support, & customization) by differentiating them from the alternatives (i.e. older or otherwise inferior PyMOL executables, free documentation, and the open-source code itself). To complain about a business acting like a business is pointless — one might as well gripe about water being wet!
Also, note that the suggestion, “There’s nothing wrong with asking people for a little goodwill, and many will happily do so especially when it’s not their own budget.” was thoroughly explored in the case of PyMOL. That exact approach was tried for two years (2003-2005) but it failed to generate enough revenue to support even a single full-time developer at a well-below-market salary.
So in the case of PyMOL at least, it is wishful thinking to believe that cost-conscious end-user scientists would voluntarily contribute appropriate value back to the project without being convinced that there is a need to do so. Indeed, the need to contribute is quite real. The assertion, “The actual value of a subscription is therefore quite low,” ignores the considerable gap which exists between raw open-source code and a ready solution to end-users’ pressing needs. Subscribers get current ready-to-run PyMOL solutions along with other benefits such as documentation. Non-subscribers get current open-source PyMOL code, older (or otherwise inferior) precompiled executables, and whatever documentation can be found on the internet. There is nothing misleading in that.
While it is true that “apt-get install pymol” can reduce the value gap on some Linux distributions, most PyMOL users are non-developers working on proprietary platforms without a compiler available. For them, the current precompiled builds available via a PyMOL Subscription and accompanied by extra documentation, features, maintenance, and support do provide *real value* above and beyond the open-source code or older precompiled executables.
Based on PyMOL’s high subscription renewal rate, such value is apparently worth paying for, and the fact that it also enables continued development of Open-Source PyMOL is a further added benefit for those sponsors who seek to advance open-source solutions while still getting their research done as quickly as possible using the latest PyMOL builds.
One can perhaps justifiably complain about PyMOL involving a tricky compromise between open-source and proprietary approaches, but it is a compromise that works and so therefore isn’t likely to change anytime soon. Thus, anyone who is put off by the PyMOL approach is encouraged to use RasMol or Jmol instead: http://openrasmol.org http://jmol.sf.net
@The People: Thanks for your response. You’ve obviously thought about these issues in-depth and have found a balance between openness and revenue that works for you.