What Business Can Learn from Open Source

dtolton writes "Paul Graham has written a fantastic article on what businesses can learn from Open Source. He covers why Amateurs can outperform Professionals, why the home is a better work environment than the office, and how bottom up ideas are better than top down. Finally he ties these lessons into the business relationship." Derived from a talk at Oscon 2005. From the article: "...the biggest thing business has to learn from open source is not about Linux or Firefox, but about the forces that produced them. Ultimately these will affect a lot more than what software you use. We may be able to get a fix on these underlying forces by triangulating from open source and blogging. As you've probably noticed, they have a lot in common."

Comments

Interesting points, but

[#FF0000_five]

has he ever practiced what he's preached? Granted, I don't have time to read that whole 10 page article. But this one line struck me:

People have always been willing to do great work for free, but before the Web it was harder to reach an audience or collaborate on projects.

That's true for pet project, but not as a full time job, Paul. Eventually, you have to eat.