I was approached in the OSI booth at OSCON to explain OSI’s membership categories.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DB5SxVjqBg]That URL again: opensource.org/join
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HP, Open Source and OpenStack
Posted on July 27, 2012 by Simon Phipps
While HP was making plenty of noise at OSCON about its deployment of OpenStack as HP Cloud, it was the discovery that they have moved their open source program office to the heart of the company that convinced me they’re serious about open source in their products. Read more in InfoWorld.
Filed under: InfoWorld | Tagged: OSCON | Comments Off on HP, Open Source and OpenStack
Call For Participation
Posted on July 26, 2012 by Simon Phipps
Have you ever attended an open source conference? In my article for ComputerWorldUK today, I briefly review four good choices that you can attend over the next few months.
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Explaining OSI Membership
Posted on July 26, 2012 by Simon Phipps
The video of my keynote at OSCON is now live on YouTube:
That link I mentioned: opensource.org/join
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Portland Submarine tour
Posted on July 25, 2012 by Simon Phipps
Portland Submarine tour, a set on Flickr.
One enjoyable perk of being a speaker at OSCON and a new author at O’Reilly Media was an invitation to their “Friends” reception at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry in Portland. It featured a tour of the decommissioned US Navy submarine USS Blueback, which you can see here.
Filed under: Links, Travel | Tagged: OSCON, Portland | 1 Comment »
OSI Opens For Membership
Posted on July 19, 2012 by Simon Phipps
You can finally join OSI. I’ve had a busy day at OSCON in Portland, OR today (apologies if I’ve been missing your messages and/or deadlines…) where interest around the conference has been high. Here are some details.
The Open Source Initiative now has two membership categories; Affiliate Membership for not-for-profit organisations, and Individual Membership for open source supporters to personally drive change. The Board expects to create a third category for corporate membership later this year. Together, these membership categories will eventually drive all the activity at OSI, including its governance.
The goal of all this is to turn OSI into a member-driven non-profit that’s a neutral venue for the things that are inappropriate or impossible anywhere else. Ideas already suggested include
- a global resource network for open source user groups of all kinds
- a repository of research on open source (like the late lamented opensource.mit.edu)
- a social fund to help developers attend open source conferences
Of course, all these will only happen if there are people to make them happen – the OSI Board is too small for this. The new Individual Membership category is the powerhouse of the change, connecting the resources from the Affiliates and future corporate members and staffing working groups to achieve concrete, time-bounded deliverables that benefit open source. As the membership grows – in all categories – so will the resources available, both practical and reputational. In future the OSI Board will facilitate rather than staff all OSI’s work.
There are so many things our global community could do together if even a small percentage of us were to unite in this way. The specifics of our different projects, the characteristics of our licenses and our differing approaches to software freedom vary, but that doesn’t mean we need to allow those differences to block our unity. As OSI’s president you’de expect me to say this, but all the same: please join!
As OSI’s president you’de expect me to say this, but all the same: please join!
Filed under: OSI | 1 Comment »
Published
Posted on July 15, 2012 by Simon Phipps
The feature I wrote for O’Reilly is also an e-book. Without realising it, I have had my first ISBN-numbered publication issued – rather a surprise!
Do you think I should write a full-length book that covers more information like this? It would cover a range of “thinking tools” for both software deployers and for software creators as they devise business strategies that incorporate open source. I’d expand on the sorts of ideas you can currently find on the Essays page.
Let me know – you can get a free copy of Open Source Strategies for the Enterprise from O’Reilly in Kindle, e-pub and PDF format as ISBN 1-4493-4117-9. Or of course the feature is also on O’Reilly Radar.
Filed under: Open Source, Webmink | Comments Off on Published
Even The ITU Is Worried
Posted on July 11, 2012 by Simon Phipps
A press release at the end of last week disclosed the ITU is worried about the epidemic of patent litigation and the abuse of RAND terms on patents by industry vendors. Of course, they think the answer is more discipline and better patents, but eventually they will work out that the software industry is no place for software patents, especially not in interoperability standards. Read more on ComputerWorldUK.
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MinkCast: Mandriva Rides Again
Posted on July 9, 2012 by Simon Phipps
I interviewed Jean-Manuel Croset, CEO of Mandriva S.A. about his plans for the future of the company and its products, together with Charles-H. Schulz, Mandriva’s director of community.
[youtube http://youtu.be/l3g5vS7FA4I]
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GPL Forked
Posted on July 6, 2012 by Simon Phipps
A new project that forks the GPL shows that Github isn’t just for software developers. See my column in InfoWorld this week for more.
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