What Went Wrong with the OPC Foundation? | Tom Burke 

Great historical moment once again ✅

So excited for this podcast!!!!

I almost have no words for how much I liked this episode, or how much I learned from it. I think I could listen to stories from Tom for hours. Some of my takeaways: (1) This statement by Tom is pure gold and I will not forget it any time soon: "Success is measured by the level of adoption." That's just how it is, that's real. It's probably why we just can't get rid of Modbus, as outdated as it is. (2) I am guilty of taking it for granted that Classic OPC was invented, but I really did not realize how much work went into getting it done and adopted. Years of work! (3) A lot of cool technical things can be done, but unless it's at a hobbyist level, then the following is essential ... (a) that the solution be made as accessible to implement as possible (b) that it has a real world value proposition ... otherwise you possibly get "so why should I adopt this?" ... question. (4) A possible way forward for the foundation is to go back to the core role of Classic OPC which was process control. Concentrate at getting adoption and the implementation at the embedded level. Thanks for this amazing interview Walker!

Y'all got me all nostalgic. :) I worked at STAC from 96 to 2000. Great times.

This podcast is incredible! 💯

Another must watch to get a picture on the origins of OT protocol development

This podcast has laid the foundation for many people and organizations "to do the right things" (as Tom and Walker described) in industrial communication on L2 and will probably be seen as the day the switch was set.

Amazing conversation! Thank you Tom for all of your hard work to start OPC, and transparency on where it could improve. I learned a lot from this conversation, would love to see a pt 2 with Tony Paine

Loved this podcast. Brought back some memories of the old days. Also remembered when AB/Rockwell bought ICOM. We used their software as well as AB6200 software. ICOM was known back then to put on a great show. I heard stories and got to experience some of them. Thanks, Walker and Tom.

This is awesome, congratulations Walker and Tom!

Stefan Hoppe watched this video! He tried to address it in the Q&A at the end of the OPC Day International - Day 5 (Asia/Europe) session.

Great episode, but should have went more into why OPC has such a hard defining a legitimate standard.

Favorite quote: Show them the art of possible

Great stuff

Great podcast. Long overdue. Keep up the good work :)

Great podcast!

This reminds me of Azure IoT response... Why is 80% of the standard not used (Why does OPC fail)? Because no one implemented it. 🤣

What a cool fire side chat this will be🎉

Interesting talk, but I think someone needs to go there and fix Tom's ceiling on the right. I think there is a bathroom over there and water is leaking through the floor.

I appreciate the ability to see the behind the scenes of how the OPC sauce was made. I for one would love to see a biography come out showcasing the real unabridged history for each and every industry association - it's helpful information. With that being said, my comment is specifically about the language Tom Burke and many others from automation industry associations state. They all universally talk about “adoption is king, we need to market this better”. To me, this prevailing mindset signifies that industry associations still just don't get it and are likely incapable of ever getting it. It's backwards. You don't sell adoption. Adoption is sold by your users & developers after publicly releasing the asset for developers to meet user needs. OPC and others sell first, worry about meeting actual needs later. This is absolute clownery. Many products exist and are widely known but they are absolute dumpster fires because they don't solve the user's needs. Tom explicitly talks about selling an idea without ever having proven anything to anyone, chiefly by virtue of appealing to big names through status instead of caring about the end user and developers. This is the fundamental difference. True publicized assets - AKA open source technology - prove themselves first by solving real needs and do so by making all associated artifacts are made public. This includes all technical and social artifacts. The mere fact that the specifications are hidden behind paywalls - a childish and petty behavior to say the least - continues to show contempt for transparency and publicized assets. Tom's got a lot of great wisdom, I just hoped to see these aforementioned points covered in much greater detail. It seems to me that symptomatic issues were discussed without addressing the critical, hard hitting topics at hand - namely the several bad actors within the OPC Foundation and its clear political gifts with big consulting companies like Accenture. I was disappointed to not hear Tom discuss the blatantly obvious fact that the OPC Foundation has never been just a “standards” organization but also a lobbying one deeply involved with politics.

Excellent interview. As someone more on the IT side, I appreciate the history and decisions around OPC.