Open Source City[Posted by David Miller on July 24, 2008] LISTEN TO "Open Source City" (24MB MP3) It's open source time again in Portland: the Open Source Convention, or OSCON, is back in town. Of course, you could argue that every day is open source day in Portland. The inventor of the wiki lives here. So does Linus Torvalds of Linux fame. As do a number of companies based on open source architecture, like the Collaborative Software Initiative. The open source philosophy is premised on a few basic and profound tenets. First, that we all have a fundamental right to the codes that run our computer systems. Those computers increasingly define our relationship to our world, the argument goes, so the codes that make them run should be open and transparent. Second, the most efficient and effective way to improve those codes is by letting a creative crowd of programmers tinker with them in a dispersed, collaborative way. When you add both together, you have all the ingredients you need for the open source "revolution." Portland isn't necessarily the capital of this revolution -- one of the hallmarks of such a decentralized system is that the whole concept of a capital is anathema -- but it's certainly one of the most prominent nodes of community. Some people have argued that the aspects of Portland's culture that make it such an ideal location for open source activity (i.e. a creative, collaborative, non-commercial mindset, speaking in broad generalizations) have also meant that fewer local OSS (Open Source Software) projects become commercially viable. As one blogger wrote two years ago: I sat across from two Bay Area VC's a few days ago that are investing heavily in OSS companies. They asked about some of the exciting companies coming out of Portland, and I didn't have an answer for them. All the companies doing great things with open source were in the Bay Area. Do you buy the argument that if you want to make a living as a programmer in Portland, open source software is both a blessing and a curse? Are you a part of the movement more broadly? What's your take on where it came from, where it is now, and where it's going? What lessons does the open source philosophy have for life outside the digital world -- for research, or business, or democracy?
It's easy to copyright your software and put it under an open source license. Just put a copyright notice at the top of your code and choose an open source license like GPL, BSD or the MIT license, for example.
As far as patenting software goes: Those are generally anathema to open source. Also, recently the patent office has cast doubt on the whole idea of software patents: http://www...of-go.html
There are several big-name companies see the value in open source development. For example, my father works for IBM at their Linux Technology Center. As he said when I was talking to him earlier, IBM thinks that having a healthy Linux system and community will be good for their company as well.
He also mentioned that he and other members of his group work a lot of extra hours, so in a way it's both their job and their hobby as well. It seems that many people find open source development more fulfilling than simply working on corporate projects, so it makes the extra work more like a hobby. I'm still just a computer science student, but once I have the skills, I hope to find some open source project(s) to work on myself!
I'm a musician using open source software to record, edit, and produce professional quality recordings. I subscribe to the Linux Audio Users mailing list, where someone posted a lament that they couldn't find any good drummers in their town. Being a drummer myself, I suggested that he try looking in cyber-space, and I got a barrage of mostly positive replies. Eventually 7 of us decided to form what became the "Packet In" virtual band http://packet-in.org/ comprised of members from the USA, Canada, Bahamas and Europe. We decided that our music itself should be "open source" and chose the Creative Commons "Non-Commercial, Attribution [required], Share Alike" licence http://cre...sa/3.0/us/
With the vision agreed to we boldly entered a recording contest, where bands are tasked with writing and recording an entire album during the month of February. We succeeded in doing this, and the result is on our webpage, of course available for free in final form. But, all of the individual tracks and lyrics are also available for free for anyone to use in any way to create their own music, provided that they don't sell their creation, that they give credit to the authors, and that they share their own modifications in return. We think we just might be the only band in the world that's this "open". Thanks for the show! P.S.: I've been using and contributing my efforts to open source since the mid-1980s. At home my wife, kids and I use Linux on all of our computers.
My name is Ahren and I'm an owner of Social Media Squad (http://www.socialmediasquad.com). We do social media marketing online and run our company completely on open source software. As a startup company this was the most viable solution for us for a couple reasons.
First of all, the cost. Open source software is generally free. Second of all the features. Since open source software is often from many developers it really opens up to new and creative features. Next, the flexibility. Since the code is available I can do anything i want with it. If i want to make a change or add a feature I can either do it myself or pay someone to do it. This allows us to customize the software however we want to do anything needed. Lastly - the community around open source. There is almost always a forum centered around the software. People can come here for help in install, help in customizing the skins, brainstorming new ideas, hiring programs to make specific changes to the code they are unable to do themselves. You don't see this kind of community around closed source software. Also, it's nice to be part of the community, giving feedback helping solve problems... creating a better free solution to inferior expensive programs. We used to use Active Collab - project management solution - that was open source, it had an awesome following but then the creator took all the hard work of the programmers and turned it to a for profit model. This was an insult to everyone that had helped him. It's the only case i'm personally aware of but it's things like that that could ruin the communities behind open source. One of the drawbacks to open source projects is that since there is many developers, sometimes there are too MANY features. everyone wants it to do what they want and sometimes it adds too much to the program and gets cluttered. Also, if people lose interest in the project there be be large gaps in updates, and some projects even just die or go stale with no new features.
Microsoft doesn't necassarily have to adapt open source. Many large corporations are (unfortunately) unwilling to grasp open source. Even small companies are unwilling. The last company I worked with i was in charge of IT for a while. I mentioned that I could save hundreds of dollars each new computer by switching to open office and linux for some of the employee that didn't do any more than telemarketing and very small amounts of email.
Microsoft's name provides a (false) sense of security - how ironic is that statement? But it's true, companies trust microsoft.
Oregon State University's Open Source Lab is a great resource to the technology ecosystem. With the generous support of Google, IBM and our other sponsors, we at the OSL help some of the world's largest and highest profile open source projects succeed: the Linux kernel, the Apache web server, OpenOffice, the One Laptop Per child project, and hundreds of other smaller projects. As an Oregonian and a Portland resident, I am proud to help make technology freer - both free as in freedom and free as in gratis - to Oregon and the world.
Open source has great potential in the public sector. We are working with the State of Oregon Department of Education to bring affordable technology into our public schools. With the help of the open source community, teachers can - at no cost to them - bring online elements into their existing classrooms and take their classes online to reach out to students who cannot get to the classroom. With open source tools, teachers can focus on innovating in education without having to worry about paying for the software. -Greg
Open source is all about the freedom to collaborate. Most corporations do not want to collaborate - they view themselves as closed fortresses. The new collaborative mindset (which includes open source software) is fits very well into the Portland mindset which is why it's so popular here. In any given week there are several open source, collaborative software meetings happening in Portland. On a per-capita basis we probably have the highest participation in these sorts of events than any other city in the US.
I use "Open Sourcery" and "Linux" fairly interchangeably to describe
my interaction with the Open Source philosophy. Open Source has changed the way I use and think about technology. I've used Linux since 2002 so I'm broadly a part of the Open Sourcery movement. I like calling it Open Sourcery because to the uninitiated Linux looks like complicated and dangerous magic, but it isn't. Linux has a long and rich history that requires significant effort to master. Currently I use Linux us to get personal and professional stuff done. I've replaced Micro$oft with Linux at home and I haven't looked back. Frankly, if Micro$oft doesn't become more collaborative, I think Micro$oft's influence on software development will continue to diminish. Once upon a time I provided Micro$oft support for a Portland-based professional services firm, but over time I became disenchanted with Window$ proprietary, buggy and bloated nature. Under Window$ things often broke, and sometimes they were hard to fix without resorting to drastic magic like reinstalling Window$ and it's applications with a digital sledge hammer. The "$" in Micro$oft Window$ euphemistically refers to how expensive Window$ can be to buy, use, upgrade and repair. Under Linux the philosophy of "co$t" is closely associated with words like "free" and "freedom". You can download Linux for "free". It doesn't have to "cost" you dollars though it can. Under Linux You have "freedom" to modify and distribute the applications you download as long as the source and its derivative works are free to others under the conditions spelled out in the GPL (General Public License). The GPL is an important philosophical tenet of Open Sourcery which has great implications for future research, democracy, capitalism, etc. I relate the GPL to the philosophy that there is abundance in this world. So-called "Scarcity" is created by greedy and short-sighted humans more concerned with enriching themselves than making the world better for everybody. The GPL represents empowerment of the group as well as the individual. Closed source software commodities are locked down with patents designed to enrich individuals and shareholders first. Everybody else be damned. Well, that's overly cynical but you get the idea. You can find more information than you want about the philosophy of Open Source on the Internet. It's way too large a topic for this already bloaty post. Suffice it to say that many hate Linux because they haven't figured out how to make money from it. Perhaps the frustrated are stuck in conventional patterns of thought. Step outside the box into the Open Sourcerer's Realm.... Linux was created by Linus Torvalds who was a college student who wanted a UNIX-like operating system that wasn't so darned expensive. Back in the day UNIX cost thousands of dollars and wasn't generally affordable to individuals. Linus soon invited others to participate in fleshing out his fledging operating system and I think he's succeeded beyond our dreams. 3.14 cheers for Linus Torvalds. Ubuntu Linux claims to have some 20,000 applications in their repository and that means I can do just about anything I can imagine. Possibilities for using Open Sourcery tools are limited primarily by one's imagination. If an application doesn't exist to do your task, code it yourself, or contract it out on the Internet. While Linux is as easy to use as ever, it's still not ready for prime time or the timid. Using Linux is like attaching a fricken' laser beam to a shark's head so you can shoot the wings off a fly: Linux offers as much or as little power as a user demands, and this sophistication can be challenging and time-consuming to master. But with great power comes great responsibility. It's up to the rookie Open Sourcerer to learn how their system works and how to take advantage of everything Linux offers that Window$ does not. For the intrepid, the journey into Open Sourcery is far more interesting than the destination. My greatest appreciation of Linux is that there are millions of eyeballs coding and debugging Linux-based applications. Evolution constantly occurs. Old programs are relegated to the binary bit bucket while new and better applications take their place. Bugs are reported and fixed quickly for the most part. And because Linux is a world-wide phenomenon, everybody can pitch in to make it better. For the first time in history we have a collaborative technology that everybody can use and contribute to without undue restriction. The ongoing improvement of Linux accrues to all. While Linux is based on UNIX which is 40-some years old, Linux is still an infant. Linux has lots of room to evolve and improve. Over the next few years the Linux desktop will become as beautiful, cool and easy to use as Apple's. But Linux will always retain its heritage of offering the computer user complete control over their computing environment. Linux will be improved or degraded by the quality of the collaboration used to evolve it. As far as People in Portland making money of Open Source, I don't have any facts to verify my feeling that the Bay Area has attracted the most aggressive and entrepreneurial Open Source advocates. The Bay Area is a hot bed of activity that thrives on competition and constant evolution. The Bay Area is a primary node while Portland might be a secondary node, but that's just a gut feeling.
The principles of open source have enormous potential to be applied to democracy. Two initiatives featured at OSCON are doing important work in this area.
The Open Source Digital Voting Foundation (http://www.osdv.org/) seeks to replace our current "black box" electronic voting systems with "glass box" voting, allowing anyone with the skill to do so the ability to audit the means by which our leaders are elected. DemocracyLab (http://www.democracylab.org) is creating an interactive online think tank, designed to give citizens the ability to collaboratively form public policy and communicate their best ideas to policy makers. Open Sources values of transparency and collaboration make it a perfect tool for improving our sometimes flawed democratic processes. It speaks to the character of Portland that we're the hub of this kind of activism.
There is an important issue in open source. Some developers may incorporate code or intellectual property that is owned by someone else. Then they hide behind the open-source agreement saying they have done nothing wrong. There are lawsuits in the open-source community over this issue. Could we include this in the discussion today?
I think that's not necessarily a valid concern specific to open source. The open source licenses are very clear about the intellectual property and how it can be reused and redistributed. These licenses have proven to be legally defensible, so I don't see this is any different than the defense of any other intellectual property issue. Yes, there will be misuse, yes there will be lawsuits, but I don't think this is any different than a novelist or photographer protecting their rights.
What makes it an issue specific to open source is that the OSLA itself is the defense for theft. Some developers may mis-appropriate code or concepts, bury it in open source, re-distribute it and now claim that they have done nothing wrong. It is the nature of the OSLA itself that causes this to be an interesting legal issue.
I agree it is a very interesting issue. I am not a lawyer, but I disagree that open source licenses can be used as a defense for theft. Open source licenses explicitly protect the author's intellectual property. Releasing code under an open source license does not weaken the intellectual property rights, it strengthens them. If someone steals code, they are still guilty of theft, regardless what license they use.
There are many projects out there - the most prominent one I know of is the HP-sponsored FOSSology (http://fossology.org) project - that scan source code and look at what code was used where. One of its specific goals is to identify whose code and what licenses are used. Just this week at OSCON I heard some talk about using the massive Google search power to fingerprint and identify code, no matter how deeply buried it may be in a project. There are companies whose whole business is to scan code and look for license and copyright violations.
That would make possible an idea I'd like to see, where everyone always owns their creation and people like Bill Gates are only able to rent or lease it. So any code worker/creator would always own their code and Gates could combine it with others into a product for sale or lease and the original coder would get something like royalties for as long as his code was in use.
So a painter could paint her painting and then lease it to whoever wants it, but the ownership always stays with the original painter. Then if it became highly desirable years later the painter would get the benefit by leasing it out at a higher rate and not some art speculator. Very interesting possibilities.
I think most of us are not very concerned about making money (at least not boatloads of money) with open source software. We're more content to make a living with it, not getting rich.
The SiliconFlorist Guy is right, the Silicon Valley mindset has been hyper focused on the almighty dollar. Whereas in |
07/24/2008 5:35:32 PM
