Nathan posted an interesting blog about what he sees as the ""missing ingredient" for project Vulcan.

I am very keen to also see some kind of App Store, because I think Notes/Domino developers have a natural pre-disposition to this concept. And with Nathan's involvement in OpenNTF I can appreciate his comments and POV on the topic with respect to Project Vulcan.

The question firstly, "Is this where IBM chooses to go ?" comes to mind. It would seem they are making moves that way. The next big question is, can they pull it off ?

Possibly, there is no reason they couldn't. Sitting here deeply in the trenches without the omnipotent POV of others, this is my (brutal) perception.

One of the lynchpins in the viability of this thing will be licensing agreements. If it's going to cost $50/user/month just to turn on the server before any budding developer/ISV sees anything, then there is little or no point in going further.

Keeping in mind this sort of AppStore will not be for general consumers, but business consumers, pricing will be higher than the apps we see for iPhone. But I need to make the point that price sensitivity is a critical component in the online economy. So don't draw direct price comparisons between applications like iBeer and iSteam and some CRM solution. Although, some CRM app's in some cases are not nearly as useful.. LOL.

Only big business pay that sort of cash for heavy "ERP sized" systems. Once again we'd be in the top 1-2% of enterprise, and miss out on the other 90+% of the market your application would also appeal to, so it would be virtually game-over then and there.

The perception (and strength) of Lotus Notes/Domino is that it can operate for smaller, simpler applications not just the fortune 500 ERP "fat-support-contract-agreements". Traditionally, IBM are the anti-thesis of "the Midas touch", that is, whatever they touch tends to turn to "poo" of varying degrees of color once they get involved. From appearances, this whole concept is fundamentally at odds with IBM's traditional culture. So, you can't have the same attitude running this sort of thing, who have been looking at the fortune 500. So, this mindset change has to occur if this app hosting concept is to have any traction at all.

Unfortunately, I have become a grumpy sceptic, and I don't think IBM knows how to change to meet this challenge, the culture is endemic. However, if IBM just fund the "appStore", and they keep their fat-clumsy hands off the execution of it, then there is potential. Note, that there are lots of great people in IBM, but the collectively competence doesn't bode well.

This grouplive thing is about to take off, but I have reservations about it's success due to the above....But I genuinely hope I am really wrong on that.

Lotus Notes applications have been ready for hosting for years now. The licensing and vision just hasn't been forthcoming. Perhaps this will change now in the post-coital reflection of LS10.

So this is my summary of what is needed if there was an appStore in the mix:
1/ Execute this as a startup.
2/ Introduce a new class of ISV whose classification is app-hosting-provider, (or "cloud-provider" if it sounds any sexier.)
3/ Bring ISV's and developers together to let them do their thing through affiliations and meet-ups formally or informally.
4/ Have competitive licensing arrangements so development can flourish according to business size. Sitting high on a "pricing pedestal", and you'll be sitting by yourself in the digital economy.

So, what do these 4 points address ? Glad you asked.

By operating as a startup, i t may protect it from the d ebilitating bureaucracy that accompanies IBM. The new ISV class would allow IBM to support it from their strengths, ie infrastructure, whilst also receive licensing royalties. This strategy also lets IBM off the hook to do marketing, because we all know IBM are very "McGoo" when it comes to marketing. Even though it was a gimmick, that Southpark thing for LS10 just made me cringe and will put me off watching the show for weeks, and don't ask me about "smarter planet".

Like I said a brutal Poi nt of View, and I am sure I don't have the whole picture. But you gotta start somewhere.