Date: Sat, 08 Dec 2001 10:29:49 -0800

03 00050 61 01120801

Mr. Jack Park
jackpark@thinkalong.com
Street address
Palo Alto, CA Zip
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Subject:	SDS Progress Needs Focus
	Business Plan Objectionable SDS Secret

Dear Jack,

Thanks for timely reply in your letter below.
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The intent of the draft business plan is to indicate added value, not to cause alarm.
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I appreciate that you took the time to click on a link and voiced objection to the explanation of SDS.
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Your objection can be strengthened by clarifying whether it applies to the entire para or just parts, e.g., "SDS has a secret design...", and then point to evidence of work product by others showing the representation is incorrect. In other words, feedback saying something is a mistake raises an alert to make a correction, which is a core part of Communication Metrics, but evidence substantiating claim of error is needed to guide correction.
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It seems to me your letter on November 30, 2000 supports the representation in the business plan, along with a fairly extensive record reported recently on October 3, 2001.
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Regardless, please submit an alternate explanation that you feel is more representative. We can work on that as a basis for moving forward.
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After all, what we are trying to accomplish, and the extent to which SDS helps us get there, e.g., is this a unique (secret) design path, seem like key criteria, so this is a good time to sort that out. If the SDS design is not a secret, then IBM, Microsoft, Eric and others can replicated it, and we are out of business. It seems like our only asset is that we have a secret that is useful. In any case, let's see how you would re-state the explanation of SDS in the business plan, and then go from there. Maybe we are not that far apart.
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As well, "secret design" may go to the heart of the open source issue.

How can we join forces, rather than work in opposition? All of us have different gifts and circumstances that contribute in different ways. I can contribute a design and understanding about scope and deployment, and others provide complimentary skills in technology, marketing, etc. If we give away the design, as seems to be suggested in your explanation of open source, how is the investment of 20 years to create it rewarded?
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I am pleased to give you personally, and others, a stake in owning SDS to induce contributions of enabling skills and effort.
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I am reluctant to make the design immediately open source, and have a thousand versions spring up that prevent focus needed for market penetration, because then there will be no deployment, and no improvement to civilization, as explained in the letter to LANL on August 1, 2000.
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Just think we need to find a compromise that balances competing objectives and avoids folly.
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Anyway, thanks again for engaging these issues. Let me know what you think, and how that would be applied in seeking grant funding?

Sincerely,

THE WELCH COMPANY

Rod Welch
rowelch@attglobal.net