Could I run a company on open source?

Here’s an overview of my evening. I booted my Inspiron 630m up in Ubuntu. I activated my bluetooth mouse and then connected my Z22 via USB and synched it with Evolution. I logged in to gAIM and started working on a biz plan with Open Office. I got to thinking about the logo I put together using InkScape while chatting about the features of the Gimp. Before posting a entry online, I decided to start streaming some shoutcast audio with XMMS in the background. Finally, I opened up Firefox to to make this post, and now I’m here…

I did all of this with open source software. It’s all free. I couldn’t do this 5 years ago. Sure, I could run a server on open source software, but the desktop just wasn’t there. Next month, Ubuntu should make their next release – a version they plan to support for many years to come. It should be one of the most complete, stable, and user friendly Linux distros around.

The entire desktop experience is about to leapfrog the Windows experience thanks to XGL. Granted, things might shift when Vista finally lands – but when will that be?

So… here I am… looking at this business plan… wondering – “Can I do all of this entirely on open source software?”… The mere challenge is motivating.