OpenBRR Launches Closed Open-Source Group

An anonymous reader writes "eWeek is reporting that SpikeSource co-founder and CTO Murugan Pal and the Open Business Readiness rating have launched a new initiative designed to maximize open-source software knowledge across organizations. While they are targeting corporate and Wall Street CIOs and IT directors as members, the current plan is not to open membership of the new OpenBRR Corporate Community to all, but to offer it on an invitation-only basis 'to ensure that only trusted participants are coming into the system,' Pal said. This would allow members to discuss sensitive issues and share information without having to worry that it would be made widely public, he said."

Comments

Non-MS Open Source

[foundme]

to ensure that only trusted participants are coming into the system

Is this just a more polite way to say they don't want MS to join?

Re:Non-MS Open Source

[iamdrscience]

14-year-old Lunix fanboys to join. Or Bruce Perens.

It's a fine line...

"Closed" Open Source

[moochfish]

So it's only available to the people they want it open to? Isn't that how "proprietary" is also defined?

Re:"Closed" Open Source

[Kadin2048]

"Open source" implies .... wait for it ... open source code! Nothing else. Many OSS organizations -- like Debian -- also have an open and democratic development methodology, but this isn't required.

I could get ten (or a thousand) of my best friends together, lock ourselves in a garage (warehouse), put a sign on the door that says "Windowz userz keep out!" and produce some piece of software, and then release it under the GPL without telling anyone about HOW we went about making up the code. Any internal documentation, functional specifications, etc., wouldn't need to be open. It's just the code that's protected under "open source." You can develop the software in any way you choose.

Not all open source projects have to be Debian-like. That's just one way of developing; not everything has to be done like that. There's nothing in the OSS licenses themselves -- we can argue philosophy until we're all dead, naturally -- that prevents OSS development from being just as much of a "sausage factory" as proprietary development.

Re:Isn't that a bit oxymoronic?

[El Cubano]

But isn't it a bit oxymoronic, and perhaps counter-productive, to do open source work behind closed doors?

Not so. This is not too different from the way Debian has a debian-private mailing list, which is open only to those who have been admitted to the project as full Debian Developers. Debian does that for protecting personal info (like vacation notices) and financial information. I am not sure that they are protecting the same type of information. However, sometimes things just have to be done behind closed doors. Hopefully, they will keep it as open as possible.

Headline doesn't reflect article.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Closed Open Source!"

When what really happens is that a set of industries try to meet up to discuss their common interests and how they can get it throug open source projects.

An example would be banks getting together to discuss how they would link up to each other's ATM's securely without having to use closed software.

OpenBRR? Closet hippies...

[gravyface]

Meanwhile, at the OpenBRR secret lair...

Stodgy CEO: "Close that door, Johnson!"
Johnson from Spike: "I'm on it, Sir. Its closed."
Stodgy CEO: "Now pass me those sandals. Do they have that Grateful Dead tie-dye in XXL?"

Closed Open Source

[dcapel]

Before people start barking about open source being "closed", lets remember a little book that we all should have read. It was written by a bard named ESR, and is named "The Cathedral and the Bazaar". It tells a story about how many open source projects are, and still are, closed in the development process. These days, many are more transparent, but there is more than one closed one lurking about.