Review: What Is Open Source and How Does it Work?

Who: Steven Weber, a Political Science Professor at University of California, Berkeley.

What/Where: What is Open Source and How Does it Work?, which is Chapter 3 from The Success of Open Source

When: Published: November 30th, 2005

The Gist

Weber introduces the topic by talking about the success of Linux and asks why would people do hard work for free? A question that classical economics doesn’t have an answer for. He thinks that the answer lies in the people and the process, not the particular problem or domain. First he looks at an idealized project (“ideal-typical”), before moving onto more concrete examples (Linux, Apache, Debian, etc.). Along the way presenting data on these projects and the community as a whole (who contributes, how do they collaborate/share, how do they settle conflicts, etc.).

Along the way he presents 8 guiding principles to open source projects, which is probably a better summary of this chapter than what I just gave:

1. Make it interesting and make sure it happens
2. Scratch an itch
3. Minimize how many times you have to reinvent the wheel
4. Solve problems through parallel work process whenever possible
5. Leverage the law of large numbers
6. Document what you do
7. Release early and release often
8. Talk a lot

The Good

• Weber contrasts various leadership styles within the FOSS community really drives home just how diverse the FOSS community is. Between Linus’s pragmatic approach (Linux, Git) to Stallman’s ethics first perspective (Free Software Foundation) to Behlendorf focus on the business model (Apache), to BSD’s to layered command, shows four completely different approaches running some of the most successful open source projects.

• As a newish developer sometimes it’s easy to forget there was a time before Github (I was fifteen and just starting to mess around with HTML when it launched). While it would be nice if this chapter was updated to talk a little bit about newer trends, it’s interesting to look back how the community used to work and how much of that continues on (mailing lists, IRC, etc.).

• All that data. Some people may complain about how long this chapter is or how much data it goes over, but I think that’s what sets this apart from other sources on this topic. Yeah, some of the charts could use some work, but that fact that he makes arguments based on data (and not the other way round), gives him points from me.

The Bad

• 2005 doesn’t seem that long ago, but it’s an eternity in a field as fast moving as software. I have a feeling the rest of the book is a bit more timeless, but since this chapter deals with so much history it’s bound to feel like it’s missing a section or two at the end.

• I think this chapter bit off a little more than it could chew with the title, “What Is Open Source and How Does it Work”. I’m basing this assertion on the fact that the conclusion was basically: let’s look at the next two chapters to actually answer the question. I think breaking it down a little bit would afford Weber the space to really flesh out all these ideas concretely. As is it sometimes feels like we’re jumping about too much, or maybe that’s just my ever shrinking attention span.

• One specific example where I would have liked to hear more discussion was around the BSD vs. GPL, Debian vs Free Software Foundation, or perhaps more concretely, the open source and commercial software debate. Should software developers remove roadblocks to using open source software at the expense of mixing with commercial software?

Questions

• Why bother with intellectual property at all? Obviously, there is value in a GPL (“copyleft”) mentality, but I don’t understand why BSD license for example is necessary. If you don’t care if your stuff goes into proprietary/closed source code, why not “unlicense” it and put into the public domain?

• What aspect of software makes it a breeding ground for open source projects? Is it because it’s a public good (freely available) or non-rivalous good (consumption does not reduce the amount available to others) or it attracts a certain type of individual or something else?

• Corollary to the above question: how portable is this model of collaboration? By that I mean how far away from software can it still be an effective tool? Hardware? Manufacturing? Food?..

Review

Excellent read that gives a lot of data-driven insight. This one chapter has put the book into my ever expanding queue of books to read when I have a bit of free time. I think it is an important read for anyone interested in open source software, or even management of software or business in general.

Rating 5/5