Herding Cats: Governance in Free and Open Source Software

Sameer Verma, Ph.D.ProfessorInformation Systems DepartmentSan Francisco State UniversitySan Francisco, Californiasverma@sfsu.eduhttp://verma.sfsu.edu

March 19, 2012 - CBMIS ProgramMona School of Business, University of the West Indies, Jamaica

Thou shalt not print – His Stevenness

May 2010. The iPad cannot print Cannot print or will not print? Who gets to decide?

http://www.macrumors.com/2010/05/10/steve-jobs-says-printing-will-come-for-ipad/

A clever hack!

Ingenuity wins!

Free and Open Source Software provides the flexibility.

How much freedom is too much freedom?

GNU Project

GNU = GNU's not Unix recursive acronym

Started by Richard M. Stallman in 1985

http://groups.google.com/group/net.unix-wizards/msg/4dadd63a976019d7

Free Software Foundation

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization based in Boston, MA,

USA. We rely on support from individuals like you to carry out our worldwide mission to preserve, protect and promote the freedom to use, study,

copy, modify, and redistribute computer software, and to defend the rights of all free software users.

GNU General Public License

V1 - 1989 V2 - 1991 V3 – 2007 Most widely used FOSS License FSF is the keeper of GPL

What does “Free” mean?

Free as in Freedom or Free as in Beer? Free implies “zero cost” Free implies “liberty”

or

Stallman's Four Freedoms

Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose.

Freedom 1: The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs.

Freedom 2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor.

Freedom 3: The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits.

Open Source Initiative

Created in 1998 to counter the confusion around the term “free”.“Free” is not business friendly.

Open Source – simply put, the source code is open.

First meeting Eric Raymond, Bruce Perens, Larry Augustin, Jon

“maddog” Hall, Christine Peterson, Todd Anderson, Sam Ockman, Michael Tiemann.

Christine Peterson suggested “open source”.

The Open Source Definition

1. Free Redistribution

2. Source Code

3. Derived Works

4. Integrity of The Author's Source Code

5. No Discrimination Against Persons or Groups

6. No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor

7. Distribution of License

8. License Must Not Be Specific to a Product

9. License Must Not Restrict Other Software

10. License Must Be Technology-Neutral

http://opensource.org/docs/osd

GPL Family - reciprocation

GNU General Public License or GPL Lesser GPL, sometimes also referred to as

Library GPL GNU Free Documentation License or GFDL

Linux kernel is released under GPL version 2

BSD family - academic

Sourced from AT&T Unix Heavily modified by UC Berkeley. Therefore

called Berkeley Software Distribution. See history at

http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/kirkmck.html

Gave rise to many Unices, including Solaris, MacOSX, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD etc.

Have their own licenses.

Android is released under the Apache license

So, which is it?

Free/Libré Open Source Software (FLOSS) Free Software (FS) Open Source Software (OSS) Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) Varies by geography Used interchangeably What really matters is the license!

Licenses

Complete list of FSF licenses http://www.fsf.org/licensing/education

Complete list of OSI Licenses http://opensource.org/licenses/category

Creative Commons

Creative Commons is analogous to FOSS except that they create licenses for content and not code.

http://creativecommons.org/ Listen to this (a capella):

http://ccmixter.org/files/anjibee/19299 Then listen to this (nicely remixed under a CC license):

http://ccmixter.org/files/hepepe/20997 Creativity grows and flows when allowed to mingle.

FOSS: Use anywhere

Linux Unix Mac Windows … ... OS Platform

Object code

Source code

Who uses FOSS

Google, HP, Intel, Oracle, IBM, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, Internet Archive...and yes, Apple and Microsoft as well!

http://www.techdigest.tv/steve-ballmer-hands.jpg

Who uses FOSS

UWI Mona...

http://coe-msb.org

Who uses FOSS

http://olpcjamaica.org.jm

Providence Basic School, Kingston, Jamaica

August Town Primary School, August Town, Jamaica

Who uses FOSS

...and Lidia in the jungles of Peru.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xby2uj_web-la-selva_tech

Learn more

http://laptop.org

Explore

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_and_open_source_software

Example: Debian

Ian Murdock = Founder of Debian Deborah = Ian's girlfriend (now wife) Deb + Ian = Debian Now managed by a non-profit foundation Elects president via elections (democracy). Values technical contributions above all else. Limited bureaucracy is more enabling than

coercive

Example: Ubuntu

A project by Mark Shuttleworth, a Debian developer turned rich guy from South Africa.

Ubuntu = Humanity towards others.

Ubuntu is managed by community council, technical board and SABDFL

Mark Shuttleworth is SABDFL Self-Appointed Benevolent Dictator for Life. Meritocracy

Governance Models?

No traditional models, but governance does exist.

Governance is ad-hoc.

Questions? Ask away!

Made with the free stuff

http://libreoffice.org