Myth of Linux Hobby Coders Exposed

Eh-Wire writes "Stuart Cohen, CEO of the Open Source Development Labs, does a short piece on the myth of renegade hackers coding in their parent's basements to create the Linux OS. He suggests this hasn't been the case for many years and goes on to claim that of the top 25 core developers, more than 90% of them are fully employed with some of the largest technology companies in the world. Stuart goes on to explode the myth of renegade programmers by saying, 'Sure, it represents a new way to create software, but the actual process looks a lot like how enterprise software has been made for decades.' A short but interesting read."

Comments

how is OSS protected? specifically!

[yagu]

Interesting article that raises an even more interesting issue, possibly legal: Aren't these coders constrained by the same template IP contracts found in most corporations today? The basic distillation of these constraints stipulate an employee basically gives up their rights and "software" no matter when it's written, how it's written... the company "owns" anything said employee writes. Are these OSS coders and contributors seeing special waivers in their employment contracts? I know the article says the community has formal procedures in place to protect OSS IP -- but what are those?

(I know these contracts are crap, but if they get your name in writing it can be a can of worms to draw a bright line between things that you (the employee) own and things they (the companies) own. I, as a contractor and consultant, have always taken contracting agreements and added my own modification which companies I work for must agree to before I'll sign the contract (I'll not get into specifics) and so far I've only had one company refuse.)

Is there empirical evidence these contributors are doing this on the up and up? I know the OSS considers the community nothing but good, but I have a certain lack of trust for large faceless, morally and ethically bankrupt corporations (which includes pretty much all of them).

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[flood6]

They often have contracts that state that any work done on their respective OSS projects is not the IP of the company, even if done on company time.

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[Wesley Felter]

The companies own the code and they contribute it to OSS projects instead of the individual coders. The result is the same.

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[LnxAddct]

Umm just be so valuable to the company that they'll take you whether or not you sign it. I currently am employed with a pretty major defence contractor working on some classified projects for the Dod, but at the interview (they offered me the job on the spot) I told them I would absolutely not sign the NDA in the form that it was (I also do some coding for some OSS projects and I wasnt giving that up just for a job). I said I've inteviewed with 6 other companies and they all were willing to compromise, IIRC Unisys has a whole little department or system set up just for such a purpose. Anyway, they wound up just asking me to sign the non-compete agreement and never asked me to sign the NDA. They more or less told me that they just wanted me to be comfortable where I work and I'm really thankful I took this job cause it is kick-ass. Moral of the story: Stick up for yourself if you feel you're being held down, dont be scared to ask for modifications, if nothing else it shows the company that you won't take shit which looks good on your character.
Regards,
Steve

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[lheal]

the company "owns" anything said employee writes.

If it's in your contract that the company owns everything you write while you work for them, then what?

In the case of Linux and other GPLd software to which the code is a putback contribution, they have nothing to say, really. What can they do with the code? Sell it to SCO :-)?

If the company is paying someone to be the main author of a GPLd package, and they insist on "owning" the thing, they'd better also have a no-compete clause. If not, then the author can quit, use a publicly available snapshot, and start doing whatever it was they didn't want him to do.

Generally a company that open sources a package or contributes to an open sourced package is going to play nice. It's in their interest to have a good rep in the community.

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[Cecil]

They probably did the same thing myself, my friend, and most of the open source coders I know did:

Refuse to sign it.

Just politely explain that that particular clause doesn't work for you, as you do a lot of programming at home for projects unrelated to their business and you want to continue to do so as you feel it helps to hone your programming skills. They will likely agree to strike out the clause. Yes, if you're just starting a new job and the job market is bad, it takes some cajones to do this. But realistically the chances are extremely low they'll simply say, "Oh, okay. Goodbye." and, presuming that they do say that, and you respond by offering to sign the damn waiver, the chances are even lower that they would continue to refuse to employ you. And at that point you can be very sure that they were just planning on using you as a carpet anyway, if the fact that you showed a bit of backbone scares them so much. Realistically, all most companies want is an employee who knows their stuff and works hard.

As a bonus, when you do this, you will likely be remembered as someone who stands up for themselves a bit more. As a result, you're more likely to get better raises and bonuses, simply due to the fact that the bosses don't really want to get into arguments or make a big deal about things most of the time (after all, their time is so valuable *cough*) so they'll give you a little more than most of the other people, since they'll think of you as someone who's more likely to argue about it.

That's been my experience anyway.

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[grcumb]

"The companies own the code and they contribute it to OSS projects instead of the individual coders. The result is the same."

That's partially true, but there's more. I worked for three years for a software company that sold a small office server that was essentially highly customised RedHat. We not only honoured the GPL on all the company-owned components, but also had employment contracts which explicitly stated that we were allowed to work on other GPL projects in our own time.

In other words there are at least a few enlightened companies out there who realise that value provided to the community comes back several times over, and that at worst having employees active in the FOSS community will make them look like Good Guys. At best, they leverage the work that gets done and roll it into their GPL product.

That company was later bought out by a larger one (which is why I left). That company continues to honour the GPL, though with somewhat less enthusiasm than the original. Anyway, they seem to have a credible business model - they just got USD 55 million in backing last month!

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[Xtifr]

GPL doesn't apply to something you don't have the right to contribute

Yes, of course, but the company doesn't have any other options. They can agree to allow it to be GPL'd, or they can discard it. It's tainted by being a derivative work, so there is no third option. (Well, they could use it internally, but that's not a very exciting choice, unless they actually use the original, unmodified software, in which case, they're probably motivated to release their enhancements under the GPL).

(Note: I am of course, assuming that we're talking about the very common case of a contribution to an existing project. If you create a whole huge public project on your own when your employment contract forbids it, then you're just insanely stupid.)

Anyway, I was mainly trying to point out that you're unlikely to hurt the project by such actions. I agree with you that I may have underemphasised just how badly you can hurt yourself through such actions.

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[swillden]

As a result, you're more likely to get better raises and bonuses, simply due to the fact that the bosses don't really want to get into arguments or make a big deal about things most of the time (after all, their time is so valuable *cough*) so they'll give you a little more than most of the other people, since they'll think of you as someone who's more likely to argue about it.

Well, they're more likely to give you the bare minimum they think will keep your trap shut, and more likely to re-evaluate every year whether or not they really like having a whiner on staff. I think negotiating on terms of your employment contract that you don't like is a wise thing to do, and if you approach it with the right tone will impress people rather than put them off.

But, seriously, arguing with your boss about raises and bonuses is rarely productive. I learned this early on in my career, when I did exactly that. I got my raise, and was then laid off three months later (well, I was given the choice between relocating to Portland or taking a severance check). The whining and the layoff weren't direct cause and effect, but neither were they unrelated.

Want good raises and bonuses? Let your boss know that they're important to you (saying "I'd really like to get a substantial raise or a good bonus next year" in your annual review is sufficient), and then do a good job. If you get what you wanted, great. If not, find another company that will give you what you think you ought to get.

Re:how is OSS protected? specifically!

[Tassach]

Or even more to the point, the terms of the OSS license force the work to be released publicly.

For a company that relies on OSS software for it's core business, it may make financial sense to hire one of the core maintainers full-time, so that they are guaranteed to get the features and bug fixes THEY need.

Romatic vision

[MikeCapone]

The simple explanation could be that it just seems a lot more romantic and heroic to think that a bunch of people in their parents' basement are taking on Microsoft...

Selected Instances

[Anonymous Coward]

This 'new finding' was fabricated by choosing the Top 25 Linux Developers (because 25 is the magic number that fits the results they want.)

Truth is, there are hundreds of major, active kernel developers.

Re:Selected Instances

[Anonymous Coward]

Truth is, there are hundreds of major, active kernel developers.

Really...

"Stuart Cohen, CEO of the Open Source Development Labs, does a short piece on the myth of renegade hackers coding in their parent's basements to create the Linux OS.

I really do my best work in the attic.

Re:Selected Instances

[imsabbel]

Hm.

You have to explain your reasoning.

Fact a: There are 100s of kernel developer.
Fact b: Most work is done by a small elite.

What would change if he had choosen the top10 or the top 50?

Re:Selected Instances

[prodangle]

Good point. I suppose it should come as no surprise that those who contribute most are paid to do so full time. The majority of contributers, who can work on OS only in their spare time, don't make it into the top 25.

Also, it makes sense that only top developers would find themselves in a position where a company was prepared to pay them to carry on with their work.

renegade prgrammers

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn them renegade prgrammers, they have been the bane of my life for many many years!

PHBs will always get it wrong.

[rice_burners_suck]

Just looking at the quality of much Linux code and the vast variety of features implemented therein will tell you that this ain't some system thrown together by some idiots who still live with their parents.

Linux has grown up and had done so many years before most people who know about it now even knew that it existed. This is similar to how the Internet and email existed for decades before the general public knew anything about it.

Now, many companies, and even government organizations, have their hands in Linux because it provides real advantages over other systems.

The myth discussed in this article is really intended for a bunch of PHBs and people who aren't that technically inclined, who believe that Linux is a toy used by rogue hackers to break into peoples' Windoze boxes and steal their social security numbers... The kind of PHBs who wrote a book I recently read. Linux was mentioned only once, and that sentence stated something to the effect that, "Linux, a free software program available in the public domain..." Yeah. Even programmers know what the public domain is better than whatever PHB wrote that disgusting phrase.

True, but ...

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Linux is not the begining of anything. Linux is a kernel that works with the GNU OS. It's just one component. Actually the real history of GNU is far, far away from what this guy is telling. It started as a revolution, it didn't recieve economic support, and rms was unemployed.

Please read this: http://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html
and specially this: http://www.oreilly.com/openbook/freedom/

Well, maybe not for the Linux kernel, but...

[skazatmebaby]

I code the project that feeds me eight feet from my bed, both located in a very small studio in a communal warehouse type deal. I don't have customers that come in and chat with me regularly, because my space isn't really set up like that - there's dirty clothes and all my messy art's done in here as well;

I thank my lucky stars that this sort of setup works, as the work environment is optimal for me - no set hours, no boss, right in downtown. Just have to live simply.

I love it.

Re:Well, maybe not for the Linux kernel, but...

[ThousandStars]

I code the project that feeds me eight feet from my bed

That's remarkable! Do you produce some kind of servant or cooking robot?

What a joke of an article

[xintegerx]

Once again, an article just for the sake of filling up space.

He suggests this hasn't been the case for many years and goes on to claim that of the top 25 core developers, more than 90% of them are fully employed with some of the largest technology companies in the world.

Yes, it makes the article more interesting to read. But it doesn't prove nor should be used to draw any conclusions. In other news, 90% of the top 25 swimmers, are very good and experienced swimmers. Swimming is not a hobby.

Number one, those people are already employed full-time, so they ARE doing a hobby.

Number two, if the top 25 people who contribute are doing a hobby part-time, and they're the top 25 people, then what does that say for the rest of the contributors to Linux? There are probably thousands of them.

This seems to actually DEFINE that Linux is coded by hobbyists. I don't know where they think this proves otherwise (that it's a MYTH.)

Mixed Message

[Salamander]

The article winds up by saying that Linux is in professional hands. Perhaps that's so, at least for the kernel(certainly less so than other OSS projects), but there is a flip side. To the exact same extent that the ranks of Linux hackers become more professional, they also become less able to claim altruism or objectivity. Somebody whose livelihood is tied up in promoting something simply cannot avoid self-interested bias when it comes to decisions about it or comparison to alternatives. I'm not saying that's a good thing or a bad thing, but it's reality. Anybody who wants to tout the "professionalization" of Linux had better be prepared to tone down some of the moralistic lecturing as well. They're becoming a business competing with other businesses, and that doesn't grant much moral high ground.

In other news...

[Kjella]

of the top 25 core developers, more than 90% of them are fully employed

...people that are fully employed usually have more time than those that do it in their spare time.

If the linux team consisted of 25 full-time employees and 10000 volunteers, I'd expect the full-time employees to take the top 25. Doh.

I'm not quite sure what the story here is. Is it that there are any at all, or is it suggesting that most of the linux developers are like that?

Besides, on the whole "how is it organized part", the GPL is a software license, not a development license. If you want to run your code tree like a cathedral, you can. It's simply a matter of what is most efficient, just like for businesses.

Still, I don't see the real news here. Full-time employees do more than volunteers? Huge projects need a review process and managers, both OSS and not? The important part is still what sets them apart, not the similarities. In my opinion, at least.

Kjella

Linux in professional hands?

[mr_majestyk]

Make no mistake, Linux is in professional hands

yeah, like these guys.

What is being exposed?

[misleb]

Perhaps I wasn't captivated by the same myth as this guy, but I don't really see what is so sensational about Linux contributers being otherwise employed. If the coding is done while not being paid for it, it is a hobby. Doesn't matter if you also happen to code for money. Can't an electrician go home and tinker with electrical things as a hobby? Now, what might be interesting is if it turned out that the top 25 Linux contributers were actually being paid by an employer to contribute to Linux. Other than that, who cares?

-matthew

Well, there's two things...

[Kjella]

a) Their copyright.
b) The company's permission to release it under an OSS license on their behalf.

You can have the latter, without having the former. That'd mean the company would be able to make a commercial product with the code, relicense the code, and the coder would not. But if released in a proper fashion, the license is still valid. And he, the person, could make a derivative of what he, the employee, has written under that license.

The only time there could be a problem is if the company has claim to the IP and has not been aware of its use (possibly because the coder thought they had no claim). But these are employed to work on the kernel, and are perfectly aware of it being licensed out.

In short, the only difference is whether the code has any commercial value on its own. If it doesn't make sense except for the specific task in the kernel, it doesn't really matter. The rest is about who can use it in other projects. I'd be more than happy to write OSS code "for hire".

Kjella

So Linux is not bizarre after all

[khaladan]

This goes to show how the metaphors in ESR's The Cathedral and the Bazaar often are not useful in describing software. I know of no software project that can be described as having a 'Bazaar' model, except for projects that consist largely of disconnected components such as CPAN or collections of drivers for OSs (including Linux), but I think these are special cases.

A more apt description is 'Open Cathedral', in my opinion.

Wikipedia is also like a 'Bazaar', but that also falls under the concept of many parts that are not precisely interconnected.

Enterprise-like development? I don't think so.

[LordNimon]

Sure, it represents a new way to create software, but the actual process looks a lot like how enterprise software has been made for decades.

Not from where I'm sitting.

I've done enterprise software development. Managing the releases is something that the Linux kernel developers don't know how to do. In real software companies, there is a quality assurance (QA) team whose purpose is to make sure that the releases pass standardized tests. I don't think the kernel developers know what that mean.

Want an example? Download the 2.6.0 kernel, untar it, and do the following:

make mrproper && make defconfig && make

This is supposed to build a kernel with the default options. Sounds relatively simple, right? Well, it's not, because about 10 seconds after you press ENTER, compilation halts with an error:

CC init/main.o
In file included from include/linux/sched.h:23,
from include/linux/module.h:10,
from init/main.c:15:
include/linux/smp.h:33: error: conflicting types for `smp_send_reschedule'
include/asm/smp.h:41: error: previous declaration of `smp_send_reschedule'
make[1]: *** [init/main.o] Error 1
make: *** [init] Error 2

That's right - you can't even build it! From an enterprise standpoint, this isn't just embarrassing, it's pathetic. It shows that there is virtually no real quality control in the kernel releases. How in the world could the kernel developers release a version of Linux without even checking to see if it compiles normally?

Maybe you're thinking it's just a one-time fluke? Well, you'd be wrong. Because the 2.6.1 and 2.6.2 kernels have the same bug!

Who says they don't live in basements?

[WillAffleckUW]

...on the myth of renegade hackers coding in their parent's basements to create the Linux OS. He suggests this hasn't been the case for many years and goes on to claim that of the top 25 core developers, more than 90% of them are fully employed with some of the largest technology companies in the world.

Just because they're fully employed by some of the largest tech companies doesn't mean they don't live in their parent's basements and telecommute.

Set A can always include Set B.

It's like saying that since the wealthiest people in the world are tech geeks, and wealthy people get hot babes, that tech geeks have hot babes.

Perhaps most tech geeks - even those who are wealthy - don't have hot babes (or hunks, whatever) - but most wealthy people (of which tech geeks are a very wealthy subset) do have hot babes/hunks?

Therefore, it's totally possible for them to live in very fancy basements in their parents homes and still be fully employed by big tech firms.

And maybe a few actually own their own homes, but who knows, because the statistics are flawed by virtue of the premise as stated.

Think of it as a Venn diagram in action. Just because top models hang with some economists doesn't make economists party animals and opposite-gender magnets.

OK... answer these:

[fitten]

How many of those who work for large companies as a "day job" are actually hired to work on the Linux kernel as their "day job"?

How many of them don't work for IBM or some other company that have a huge vested interest in the Linux kernel (SuSE/Novell, RedHat, etc)

How many of these people work on non-OSS for a day job and basically are subsidising OSS through non-OSS work?

If any work for non-OSS companies, how many of those companies know that this is going on?

If any work for non-OSS companies, how many can actually be working in a conflict of interest situation?

My theory has always been that few people actually work and make a living doing OSS. Most work for non-OSS/commercial/proprietary companies and are basically subsidized by these companies. Also, if these people aren't already independently wealthy, they wouldn't be able to feed themselves or their families by their work in OSS.

Re:The Ubiquitous PHB

[tomhudson]

by then quantum computing will be the norm, and Microsoft will have to delay Longtooth

Microsoft WANTS quantum computing. Like Schrodinger's cat, if the machine looks like its crashed, just turn the MONITOR off and on again - 50-50 chance that next time you look, it's actually still running. Of course, if it IS running and you blink, it may NOT be running when you open your eyes.

How this is different from today is left as an exercise for the reader.

Re:Really.

[LnxAddct]

I'm more then capable of talking about what I do for a living. Saying that the projects are classified is a habit of mine so people won't take offense when I tell them that I can't tell them something. It is perfectly okay to say "I work on classified information and deal with intelligence that can't be discussed." In some cases, yes you have to completely keep quiet about what you work on, but usually they'll move you somewhere because its pretty hard to live a lie and this whole second life of yours has to be put together. Anyway, anyone working on any such projects knows exactly what they can't talk about and exaclty what they can. Oh and one more thing to keep in mind in case you ever are talking to someone with some level of clearance, it is their job to tell you when to stop and their job to control what they answer. Often times I find when I'm talking to people about what I do they'll ask something and then be like "I'm sorry I shouldnt have asked that" implying that they did something wrong, and I always politely respond "Don't worry about, you can ask whatever you want, it is my job to tell you when enough is enough".
Regards,
Steve