i more or less agree with rich, but understand your intention (Landon). i think a big 'problem' is that corporations don't even know what open source is. same thing with creative commons. they hear about these things from their 'anarchist friends' and it doesn't fit into how they view the world. just like asking an attorney saying "all rights reserved" when it's not necc. important/useful. the idea of anything less is antithetical to their training and culture of commerce.
but...i think something like GOSCON is a wonderful proving ground--the incentive is different in the public sector and many agencies at various levels of government (and non-profit) are trying to embrace concepts that save money, increase productivity and shift cultural bias. it's of course a minority position within the gov, but there are people making a difference. we're not at a point where measuring open source citizenship is meaningful. simply *having* contributions to open source is great. eventually (not sure when that is, but it happens over time...) it will hopefully be possible to have a (sort of) sample size large enough to consider measuring/benchmarking, but until that time comes it's sort of like trying to set a standard with a sample size of one. my $.02 (from a distinctly non-codiing, post-mba-trying-to-reeducate-myself entrepreneur) Ian White :: Urban Mapping, Inc 690 Fifth Street Suite 200 :: San Francisco CA 94107 T 415.946.8170 :: F 866.385.8266 :: www.urbanmapping.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Rich Gibson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [email protected] Sent: Friday, April 20, 2007 11:08:24 AM (GMT-0800) America/Los_Angeles Subject: Re: [Geowanking] Measuring Open Source Citenzenship Hi Landon, With respect, I think that is a bad idea. Framing this is a matter of judging various types of citizenship creates an additional obstacle for companies to dodge when attempting to go FOSS. > I think it is very possible for a company to release code under an open > source license, but at the same time to be lousy >members of the open source > community. You initially used the word citizenship, and here moved to 'members of the open source community,' and decided that some members of the community are 'lousy.' This framing bothers me. Code is good. Releasing code is good. Anything beyond that is gravy... Regards, Rich On 4/20/07, Landon Blake < [EMAIL PROTECTED] > wrote: I've been thinking about writing a short article on the involvement of corporations in the open source world. Specifically, I want to describe a system or set of rules for measuring the quality of a company's involvement in an open source community. In other words, I want to provide some measuring sticks that can help developers and managers answer the question "What type of citizen is this company in the open source community?". I think these guidelines can help developers and users that want to evaluate the merit of companies that claim to follow the open source or FOSS idealogy. I think it is very possible for a company to release code under an open source license, but at the same time to be lousy members of the open source community. I've already got some of the measuring sticks in mind. Has anyone done work on this topic before? Would you like to share with me what measures you use to gauge the "worthiness" of a company involved in open source development? I think this will become a more important subject as open source software development becomes more mainstream and more companies become involved. I think it will also be important to separate the corporate leeches from those that really give back to the open source community. Perhaps a standard rating system will evolve from the article, if one does not exist already. Thanks for your thoughts. The Sunburned Surveyor Warning: Information provided via electronic media is not guaranteed against defects including translation and transmission errors. If the reader is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this information in error, please notify the sender immediately. _______________________________________________ Geowanking mailing list [email protected] http://lists.burri.to/mailman/listinfo/geowanking -- Now offering training and consulting in maximizing corporate efficiency using Web 2.0 tools and techniques. Rich Gibson Chief Scientist (and bottle washer), Locative Technologies http://mappinghacks.com http://geocoder.us http://testingrange.com AIM period3equals
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