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Open Source Needs Leadership?
alessio writes: "At Webmonkey there is an article from Jay Greenspan which reports from Open Source Conference 2001, and I cannot agree with 99% of what he says. However, there is a point worth of discussion: do the Open Source/Free Software movement need a 'leadership' to better fight back new stuff from Redmond? His answer is yes, my would be no, but maybe it's not obvious."
To my mind, the more important leaders of the OS/Free movement are the leaders of headline projects. Linus Torvalds is the most obvious, but people like Miguel de Icaza are also important. It's these guys who actually provide a focus and a vision for the abundant supply of open source labour that would otherwise go to waste. They provide actual goals and actual directions for the community to follow, which results in getting something done. The philosophers like Stallman are important (and I realize they've contributed significantly on the practical side), but the ultimate goal of OSS is to produce software that people like and use, not write treatises. That's how we'll achieve Total World Domination.
To those who wish the community to go in a certain direction I would say: do what Torvalds and ESR (and the Mono guys) did (albeit somewhat unintentionally in Torvalds' case). Create the beginnings of a project that embodies your ideas and put it up for your peers to assess and maybe contribute to. And be prepared to take on the administrative duties (filtering, reviewing and applying patches mainly) that go with keeping the project going. It doesn't matter if it sucks or not, that's for others to decide. If it sucks, no one will contribute and the project will go nowhere, no harm done.
Ahh... "organizations" (e.g. Microsoft, IBM, etc) derive from the word "organize". Despite how much you may hate Microsoft and Adobe, they have something that is really fundamental to growth, organization.
I have found in my own "big business" experience that not everything that goes on at the big business level is "right" or "the best way of doing things" but things still get done. What any business needs is a management chain that understands the best ways AND does them. Some companies have this, some don't, and some fall in the middle.
The problem with OSS has been stated, waring distros, KDE vs GNOME, 10+ window managers, 10+ distros, 10+ console text editors, 3 browsers, etc etc etc... the list can go on forever. If OSS was made into an organizational unit, these things would be minimized (or maybe 2-3 organizational units). For instance, why do we need 10 text editors? We don't... we have "preferences" but I think newbies "prefer" pico because it's easy to use (okay dont argue that XYZ is easier than pico, it's not the point).
In an organizational unit, a group of people would sit down and evaluate (to the best of their abilities) how one solution outperforms another solution. They'd run performance tests, user tests, and more importantly how easy it is to maintain a particular set of code. Once they've added everything together, they'd choose a single text editor, linux distro, etc etc.
Where, right now, let's say there are 10 text editors, each has a group of 3 people working on it. If we were to evaluate and eliminate the worthless projects (as an organization would do) we can better pool our resources together so we can have 2 maybe 3 text editors, each with 10 to 15 people working on them. Doing this increasing the time and manpower each project has and increases the power, flexibility, and usefulness of the application.
Someone mentioned the *BSD distros, there being too many of them, well there are only really 3 major ones, but then the comment was made about Theo. I don't really know Theo and I haven't spoken to him, but I don't think many of you have either. Theo had disputes with people, which he felt were strong enough to leave a particular project and start OpenBSD. This has been done all over the Linux community as well on multiple projects, so to say Theo is the only one who "can't get along" is rediculous.
Right now, every Linux project is like a bunch of a warring factions. This is a form of anarchy, and it has proven through history that anarchies do not do well in the bigger scheme of things.
The linux community, as a whole, needs some kind of organization.. and I don't mean letting Linus and Cox run the show. We need people who are business-oriented and not technical to run the organization. This way decisions can be made to better utilize the resources of the Linux community.
Your list is hardly a list of LEADERS. A list of oppertunists, yes. Leaders, no.
RMS comes the closest. He stays on target when he talks. Yet, the FSF had their spokesperson whine that *RMS was not invited to the Open Source conference*, yet RMS is the 1st to say "GNU/GPL is not Open Source". (if you are not Open Source, tell everyone that, THEN don:t get invited to an Open Source conference, your message is being heard and understood)
ESR spends his time promoting GNU/Linux, but when asked, he says "BSD deserves more press than it gets". Yet, ESR will not lift a finger to get BSD more press. But, hey, free trips to speak on GNU/Linux, why mess that up with being inclusive rather than exclusive eh?
Bruce Perens has a web page where he talks about how he is all for Open Source. Yet, when you read his works, all he does is talk about the GPL. In fact, he admits that he is "linux advocate". Again, so much for being inclusive.
Miguel de Icaza referes to the GNOME project and the MONO efforts as "Linux software". Yet, the main GNOME web page point out that it is Open Source, and runs on MANY platforms.....the software is not "Linux Software".
OSDN. It is not about Open Source as it is about Linux. Same goes for the Open Source development Lab (Yea, the one funded by Red Hat) Call it the Linux lab or the Lnux development network if you are unwilling to be inclusive.
Tim O`Reilly is a better leader for Open Source than the others. Mr. O`Reilly says Linux when he manes Linux, and when he says Open Source, he includes BSD/Artistic/X licensed software.
Unlike the "other" "leaders" who wrap themselfs up in a cape of "open source leader" because it gives them a soapbox to preach from. Or, puts some money in their pocket.
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
Open Source needs detail-oriented, small-time, painstaking *work*. Not vision, not tirades against the Evil Empire of Redmond, not manifestos. It needs a lot of people to sit down and clean things up. Small things, things that collectively annoy the user, but individually are too boring for an OSS developer to bother with.
That's how good software, how good *anything* gets done. The OSS way however, has been that for something to be refined, polished, it has to "scratch an itch", it has to annoy someone enough *and* have that someone be skilled or talented enough to go fix it him/herself.
How do you get people to work on minute trivial things that they normally donot care about? the one time-tested way is, well, to *pay* them to do it. Where do you get the money? well, you will probably need a corporate structure that will fund these developers and that will be able to stand on its own two feet.
In other words you need companies, companies like Active State, theKompany, Digital Creations (now Zope) and a few (very few) others. You need to let companies sell OSS without bitching all the time that they are ruining your free lunch. You need to let companies have pay-to-play versions that are ahead of the OSS one so that they can financially support development, QA and documentation. You need to have companies have non-GPL licenses on their products without going Homeini on them.
Preferrably all of the above do not involve flammage and mail-bombing and invocations of Rights and Freedom. Writing software is not Speech, it is *not* equivalent to expressing one's opinion on common matters ("politics", people call them). Writing software is hard, painful and mostly boring work, engineering work. It needs good design, a painstaking devotion to quality and most of all someone to be paying that budget.
What you people really need is to change the stereotypical image that most IT departments have of the Linux community.
Stop acting like children. Stop crying about everything Microsoft does (Hell even Sun has SOME restraint when it comes to that).
The Operating System market is NOT Cuba and Linus/RMS is NOT Fidel Castro. Until you learn the simple fact that you must show respect towards your competitors in order to be respected, you guys will always just be Fringe Fanatics.
Gam
"Flame at Will"
I love idealists not because I am one, but because they make life bearable for pragmatists such as myself.
While Bill Gates may be the person that many of us love to hate, he is the icon of Microsoft, and puts a human face on an otherwise impersonal corporation. He just looks unassuming, and mild mannered... kind of a "geek next door" look.
If someone in the open source community were to step forward to become the poster boy and PR representative to counter the FUD that Gates distributes to the media, it would probably help immensely.
Of course, with a 20 in charisma, he's going to be rather hard to defeat.
Your reality is lies and balderdash and I'm delighted to say that I have no grasp of it whatsoever. - Baron Munchausen
The fanatics however, who think politics instead of just sourcecode, need a leader, to 'fight' (haha, it's sourcecode, not a war) whatever they declare an enemy.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
Kill him, mod him down, GPL him.
Ignore his heretical(although well thought out and reasoned) arguments.
Be different from the rest by being just like every other fat manchild living in their parent's houses.
It's in the nature of the open source movement that there's no-one who can actually appoint leaders. But don't we already have de facto leaders? People like ESR, RMS, Perens, O'Reilly etc. who speak up for open source when there is some controversy? In fact, Jay Greenspan seems to acknowledge this in his article.
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You need leaders if you want to lead the market...
I think the issue of leadership that rises with open source project is often the lack of focus. People code what they feel is missing, or what they feel like coding. This means the devellopement follow a more organic and darwinist path, not a strategic one.
I don't think that the organic way is worse than the strategic way. While things might be less focuses, they also are not so easily distracted by fads. Sure people will add new skins and UI gimicks to programs, but those who believe their software should do this or that will simply not change ways because this or that is the fad.
I would say that the main issue nowadays with open source is simply political. Most people I know that program something open source do it because they feel it is missing, or they want to fiddle with the code or notion, or want a variant of this or that, or a doing research in universities. They have only a vague political vision - they certainly don't do it to overthrow microsoft - it might be a nice side effect, but it's not the main motivation - they do things for themselves.
But of course this does not fit with the dominant capitalism credo. And this psychology is not liked by the media: can't do headlines with people doing things in their corner because they feel like it. Real geeks don't go to discuss with the media, they code in the basement...
What happens is simply the corporations noticing that open source does not behave they way a corporation does, big surprise. So of course they think that if open-sources wants to take strategic positions in the market it should have strategic leadership...
Of course this premise is broken, because open-source is a good approach do build sturdy systems which might not make economical sense (at least for MS), most killer apps where first closed source. Eventually, an open-source contender came, but generally the original app was closed source. I don't think this will change tomorow, but then again I don't think this is tragical.
It's easy to convince people to code to get their PC and their hardware do this or that - to support a card, or to crash less, or to build a clone of this cool game, or to have a window manager like this system. It's another game to convince them to build a framework whose goal is not so clear...
Warning: Rant: The biggest problem with open source is user interface. I see plenty of programmers involved, but few UI experts, let alone serious usability testing. Until this happens, I'm sorry, but open source doesn't have a chance. Done mark me as a "traitor". I'm a big fan of the open source movement, but I'm also a programmer with 22 years in the field. The fact that most open source software is difficult for me to use is proof enough. Sorry, but that's the cold hard facts.
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Besides, what is peoples obsessions with writing dull essays and "papers" about the topic du jour. Write some bloody code, instead of feeding the techie webs insatiable appetite for content, usually (as in this case) the same six or seven ideas endlessly rehashed.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Open source doesnt need a leader. We already have a leader. OURSELVES. Open source lets ANY one of us become a leader, if, by ability and personality, we are capable of it. Why appoint anyone? The fluid leadership status of various projects gives those projects a far greater dynamic than a project where you are forced to work under someone, regardless of their suitability.
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Live long and prosper.
Be nice to each other.
Who's with me?
Or, y'know, alternatively we could continue to fight on all fronts exactly as we've been doing already (and people do actually seem to be making money after all). Anyway, who the hell wants to spend their spare time working for a giant multinational Linux Corp? Not me.
BTW, I think I should point out that Jay's doesn't always hit the mark quite right. Take a look at his premature eulogy for Slashdot. Take what he says with a pinch of salt, folks.
.. was the object of open source to "fight back against Redmond"? Sure, if they create some new product that's a good idea, theres no reason not to implement our own open version. This happens all the time. But if Microsoft released "Inflatable Dartboard v1.0" I get the impression that some jerk would release a free version, just because they feel the need to compete with MS.
From my point of view, I just want tools to get the jobs done that I need to do. If those tools happen to be similar to something released by MS, then fine. If not, thats just fine too. In my opinion, some of the best free software is that which was created to fill a niche of its own, not to compete against MS.
"But now, as we move into the next phase of the Internet, it's time to pick one overall strategy and stick to it. If OS continues on its lovably factioned way, it risks losing its important role in the future of the Internet."
Here read: ".NET is coming out, should there be Linux support?". This article was not about leadership for Open Source, it's about supporting M$ technologies - and this arguement has already happened with all the other Ximian/Mono articles that came out before this one. ( = 'bandwagon' + 'missed')
"Can O'Reilly, Stallman, and others agree on one approach and convince others to follow it"
Short answer: 'no'. It being Open Source, some people may want to work on supporting stufflikethis(tm), other mights not - but there should never be anyone standing up and saying 'Open Source should/should not support this project, and any work done to provide this support is valid/invalid.'
At the end of the day, it's going to be a bigger audience than this who decides whether it was worthwhile or useful.
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Choice is good, fragmentation is bad.
It sounds like you're saying: If KDE and Gnome both produce a desktop, that's wasted effort. But if Microsoft and Corel both produce an office suite, that's competition and choice for the user. I don't see how those two statements can be compatible.
The shareholder is always right.