On Wed, 2010-11-17 at 21:00 -0800, Adele Burnes wrote: > I think this is the second email you are getting from me today, but I > just saw the note below and I had to respond - I love your social > contract and all its values and principles - that is fantastic.
Hi Adele, Thanks for your answer - and glad that you like our social contract. : ) Finding BetterMeans was a really good surprise, it doesn't happen that often to meet another organization that upholds the Open Enterprise values! Actually, I'm wondering if you came across other similar organizations since your launch - I bet they were also very glad to find out about BetterMeans! I've seen a few listed on https://secure.bettermeans.com/projects , but I guess you've been discussing with a few of them, and you probably have some further insights. > I'm so glad that you have found Bettermeans, and I'm sorry that it has > taken so long to respond, unfortunately Shereef has been sick and I > have been working hard to be responsive to everyone, but it has been a > wild week. No worries at all - I know how it can be sometimes : ) > I understand that us not being Open Source is a barrier for you. We > struggled a lot with this questions and we settled on this: > We're not open source, because we haven't figured out a business model > that sustains us and keeps our software open source. The moment we do, > we will open source the software. Meanwhile, we are focused on opening > up the org structures. If folks are passionate about opening up the > bettermeans source, they can join us, and help us figure out how to do > it, and pay our bills. Yes, the fact that you are willing to look for a good way to do this is something I really appreciate - and I know that it can be tricky to find the right formula for a given project. I've been thinking a bit about potential business models that could work if you open source the code, but I bet you have given this a lot of thinking yourselves. Is the discussion about this available somewhere in one of your workstreams? I can spend some time reading it, and hopefully contribute a few comments. > We remain, however, huge advocates for transparency. So while our code > is not FOSS, it is shared code. Anybody who joins us, and agrees to > the open enterprise model, can see the code. On another note, our main > product is the Open Enterprise Governance Model. This is where a ton > of the innovation and tweaking went, and that's what we're passionate > about ultimately, and we've chosen to license that as creative commons > because it furthers our mission for everyone to run this way. The > software is just one strategy of getting it out there. Definitely - it's not only about the software, and the Open Enterprise Governance Model is a great piece of work from what I've read so far - congratulations for that! I haven't read everything yet, but I plan to finish soon (btw, there are some formatting issues on http://bettermeans.com/front/open_enterprise_governance_model.html - if you want I can fix them while I read it, just let me know what's the best way to provide you with a diff). The software is still an important component though, especially when it's used for the main communication channel - each project has specific requirements/processes and will likely need some specific adaptations, and one needs to ensure it doesn't get its communication stream trapped in case if anything goes awry. But I won't give you a lecture on the importance of open source, I guess you already know all that : ) > If you are interested in joining us in our work that would be > fantastic! We are always looking for like-minded folks to collaborate > with. My understanding (as the not as technical person) is that > getting started will take some code orientation, which we may have to > wait on Shereef for. However I'd love to speak with you and hear about > your interest, and I can tell you a bit more about our team and the > direction we are going in. That would be great! As per our social contract, we would only be able to contribute on open source code, but if at the end we find a way to achieve that I would be definitely interested. Actually, this would need to be discussed on our end, but we could maybe even sponsor some of the improvements, with manpower or money. We are not rich, but if other projects did the same, this could actually be a lead to find a way to open source the code - by asking projects that use the software to sponsor the items in your workstream that they would like to see implemented. Xavier. _______________________________________________ Farsides mailing list - [email protected] Wiki: http://farsides.com/ List: http://farsides.com/ml/ Forum: http://farsides.com/forum/ Ideas: http://farsides.com/ideas/ Chat: http://farsides.com/chat/
