The fact is that we’re all potential victims of a bigger fish. We knew it when we built our app. We’re a couple thousand lines of code away from extinction. Bill Gates said he worried most about 2 kids in a garage. These days most of us are the proverbial kids in the garage, -and we should be scared of the Microsoft’s of the world. Those companies who are big enough and rich enough to give away for free the thing we’re eeking out a living selling.

The internet has been falling all over itself trying to figure out where to stand on the 37 Signals:Campfire / Google:Huddlechat issue. It’s a great discussion, and it’s about time we had it. It surfaces a lot of issues.

• Is Google the new bad guy?
• Has 37 Signals time past? Have all of ours?
• If the iPhone can have “over 200 patents” why is it so easy to copy a web app?
• There are only about 5 or 6 types of information we typically share, so are all communication apps the same?

The answers to these questions haven’t really been answered satisfactorily yet. It might be years before they are. One thing is for sure, -a simple application is simple to copy. Thank goodness there is a move towards simpler tools online, but how long and how many of these apps can last? Or a better question is “Why would they be able to last?”

When you ask the right question, it’s easier to answer. Great products last for several reasons:

• Brand loyalty
• Discerning quality
• A succinct message of how it can fit in your life
• Dependable service and attitude

Since day one of our using Basecamp, there have been knock-off open-source alternatives. We didn’t use them for all of the above reasons. Companies like 37 Signals go to great lengths to indoctrinate their customers. Spend 5 minutes with their blog, and you’ll walk away being a semi-evangelist yourself. Google like Yahoo! and so many before it tend to make half hearted stabs at many ideas, and see which one sticks. It’s the corporate way. You don’t put your heart into an idea until it’s proved it’s viability. It’s the complete opposite of the bootstrapping entrepreneurial spirit.

If our web apps are so easy to copy, and so easy to give away for free, -we’re all doomed. We don’t believe it for a second. In fact we doubt Campfire loses a single customer because of Huddlechat. It’s thinking like this that’s causing the overprotective music industry to atrophy. Like Apple, we shouldn’t sell product, we should sell net benefit, and lifestyle. A product is duplicable, but an attitude is impossible to fake.

Follow up: Shortly after writing this, Google canned Huddlechat. It might seem like a victory for 37 Signals, but it’s probably a loss for us all. Despite the tone of this article, -competition is good whether it’s the big guy or the small. If we’re all focusing on what we ought to be, the consumer, then it’s an obvious answer.