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Getting Paid to Write Open Source Code
Thanks to Norm J for pointing out the recent Doc Searls'
article that talks about the growing number of ways to earn money while writing open Source code. This article is especially interesting in light of CoSource and SourceXChange. So, buckle down, and have fun-get paid to do what you love.
Neither CoSource or sourceXchange mentioned what kind of licenses the sponsored programs are to be written under. Is it to be determined by the sponsor, the developer, or CoSource or sourceXchange? If the code is to device drivers or modules for Linux or some other project the license is predetermined but original projects are another story.
This isn't free software development any more, that's teleworking. I write my best code when I'm not under some kind of pressure to deliver the goods. How many free-spirited developers will sign onto this kind of remote controlled slave-work?
no but it is funded by the government
that would make these.... Free Software Temp Agencies
Now you too can work for the Yakuza. Hey, I have this virus project that needs to be written. Wanna join us?
I don't think the FSF will be too interested. This is just a new way of doing business - a way to facilitate contract programming, taking into account licensing issues.
The licenses will be chosen by mutual agreement between developer(s) and contractor, and could really be anything from GPL to BSD to in your face closed source. Its a fairly normal contract process with open source included as an option, and online facilitation.
The facilitation could be nice though.
Business stumping up the cash will want a return.
They probably wouldn't sponsor development of GPL'd widely usable stuff, because their competitors would just borrow it. You need a way to get whole industries to sponsor it.
Maybe charity or research organisations could get involved in sponsorship (kind of like USENIX and *BSD).
--MolochHorridus, small time programmer (for love)
Please note that BSD-style licenses do qualify as Open Source AFAIK. If you're the one with the money, you get to specify the license.
Simple,
You can no longer afford the high cost of development. Also the industry is splitting up into hardware sellers and software sellers, not those that do both. Look at SGI who apparently is leading the pack in this theory.
This is just like outsourcing. You would use it for non-critical implementations, but keep your company stuff in house. SGI for example will in the near future worry not about OS competition, but instead concentrate on what they do best(garphics workstations). If all of the big unices adopt Linux, then they can each carve out more of a niche market for themselves and concentratemore on specific parts of the trade. Competition is deadened because they all would be based on linux at the lower levels. Cost's for development would be spread accross the playing field and everyone wins. We get cool new apps and they get an entry point for ex-microsoft customers who they later pawn off there more expensive stuff on(AIX,Solaris,etc...). It really is the best move for them, and if I was old billy boy, I would be very concearned. Afterall, none of his bag of tricks will work here(IE, bullying, bribery, buying out the competition, giving software away for free).
Joe
Bwahaha.
Don't really know how to respond. What are you calling the internet? The computer OS's people use at either end, or DNS/SMTP/HTTP and routers/servers. TCP/IP stacks?
Commercial Unix was developed in an open source fashion then proprietrised.
Get my facts straight?
:/
Are you saying IE is the internet?
--MH
John Hebert
"John Hebert"
CoSource would be perfect if it were a non-profit organization. Unfortunately they're a business and they want to make money. That rules out projects were someone only donates a workstation and a software package and the developers do it for free. Believe it or not, this is quite common in the Open Source community.
Another drawback I see with this business setup is the fact that donations aren't tax deductable.
Maybe what we really need is a free CoSource clone?
> But besides Netscape, which `corporation' has
> actually gave us any interesting source code
> (not hidden behind 1,0000 lines of legal crap)?
Ericsson has Open Sourced the programming
language/compiler/etc Erlang
and also the web-farm thingy (written in Erlang)
called Eddie.
They're both pretty significant hunks of code.
Being driven by time to market, the first to produce to goods, tends to produce shitty code. I can't see how this will be a benificial model for development.
did you even read the article????
LETS PLAY: What is wrong with the License?
Yes, what is wrong with the license? What is the point of Open Source, if you do not keep the license? Since you are getting paid, I understand that the customer and the entity that hired you for the work will also have a piece of the license, but the developer shall also be part of it. Neither one of the web sites addressed this point in the open. It clearly shows that $$ is really the focus behind all this. Both sites should be ashamed of themselves! Sure, I wouldn't mind paying for part of the license of Apache either, and that's really the motivation of all this! You know the $$ potential behind all this? It's funny that so many bright individuals are falling for this scheme, because that is what this is. Sure they will put it in the open, but they will also provide first copies to interested companies that are willing to pay them, not the developer, big $$. Plus, they will find ways of cashing and recashing your work. To them I say kiss my behind! If I want to get paid for programming, I get a job as a programmer. Still, I bet that a few not so bright individuals will take the bate only to find a few years down the road that your creation has made a small group of individuals multimillionaires. So go ahead! You'll see!! And then people talk bad about Mr. Gates... at least people at M$ can become millionaires too!
Looks to me like an interesting attempt by Hewlett-Packard to squeeze around IT labor shortage. I would give them a prize for their creativity and coolness, but it looks to me like they are just capitalizing on the "open source" theology. They're just gunna squeeze cheap fruit out of young idealistic programmers.
I think that, for many of the projects that will be proposed, there won't be only one company or sponsor who pays for the project. I see one of two choices for ownership: The original group of sponsors owns the software. Anyone who wishes to use the software or the souce code would have to reimburse the original sponsors. The sponsors would probably appoint one person/company to recieve and distribute the money. -Or- they can release it as open source. In the case of drivers where there might be 500 people who pay money for the development of the driver, distributing the money might take too much effort, and each sponsor might not care if they get $5 back when they only paid $10 in the first place. I'm not trying to imply that this is the only reason to release the project as open source... I think that this will allow the collective skills of programmers to be used more efficiently.
But they forget:
Its only work when you have to do it...
It aint fun if you have to do it...
If you get paid to do it, its no longer fun...
and so many other homilies that come to mind.
What I was tryng to say is, YES; in the future (MS has already done this with their TCP/IP code). DEMANDING that any changes will be send back to Microsoft and the code cannot be distributed freely. This is Open Source, non-free software and a direct result of Commercialism of Open Source. Linux catches on, the open source buzz catches on.
I'm not saying you, or ALL companies are bad, but a lot of them will not help Linux in any real way. I have said this to the Debian guys and I have said it before: the Free Software vs. Free Beer arguments doesn't hold. Free Software = Free Beer, period. Yes, you can still make money out of it, but it won't be the way companies would like it. They would rather forget about free software and bend "open source" to get it's benefits and none of it's drawbacks.
Hmm, this could get wierd.
"I expect I'm going to have to write wickedly
precise requirements with respect to coding standards; things like "no
compiler warnings beyond those generated by the starting source base",
etc. Things that I need guaranteed if I'm going to be able to support
the resulting software."
Good point. Requirements will need to be very specific, but hasn't this always been the case ? Another issue is the traditionally iterative cycling between design, coding and testing. When is the application "done" ? Does "done" include: documentation in certain formats, test plans, end-user acceptance, etc., etc. ?
Hi, nice to see you on Slashdot.
A couple of questions: Will your site only cater to the Linux world and the (L)GPL licensing model? I admire the idea behind Cosource but I strongly believe that you should support different licenses. If a bunch of people get together to sponsor a project under the APSL you should be willing to host that too.
Also what do you think about non-monetary compensation? If I decide to donate a high-end workstation for 6 month to enable a porting effort would that be supported on Cosource?
Lastly how do you intend to make money? Will we have to pay you a commission to get our projects listed on your site?
Sorry if these questions are already answered in a FAQ somewhere. I think other people might be interested as well so please post your answers here if possible.
Thanks.
If I understand you correctly you were paying individuals to port FROM Linux TO your OS. What OS is that? What kinds of applications were ported? How many lines of code? How long did it take? Where did you find the developers?
This sound like a great idea. Give us some details please!
> It's like asking a songwriter what in his/her > song is original -- same language, new twists > > and turns, further propegation (sp?) of this new > paradigm.
Woah!!! Hang on a second. I know this is way off topic, but I must take severe offense to this previous remark. I think it's absolutely phenomenal that nearly all music we listen to is comprised of the same 12 tones, yet there is utmost variety. Furthermore, despite the limited palette, not every Joe is a good songwriter. In fact, songwriting is a skill that very few are truly skilled at.
To bring this back around to software (now that I've vented), all of our software comes from a very small set of computing ideas strung together. Yet, once again we have a huge variety of software out there. And also, as with musicians, the talented programmers are few and far between.
Look at the crew who develops Linux. There are a small core of programmers who are talented system architects. I don't think there are enough people like them to build every company's specialized piece of software. Just like the current industry, there's going to be a mountain of crappy software out there. Open source has created good software by levering many talented programmers. Spread them thin and the quality code is no longer.
So, for this reason, I think paying for Open Source is a pipe dream. The benefits disappear because there just aren't enough good programmers. If you were a company, would you bank on random luck to get your software built? That's sure not how they hire people today!
"Programmers will starve!"
No.
Theres another very good reason programmers won't starve: technical development.
Our systems are getting increasingly complex. Open source software is one way to deal with complexity. It gets bugs ironed out of systems and allows international cooperation within industry. It creates defacto standards which are completely (I'm talking BSD or GPL here) accessible to all who use them.
We need an open source foundation for our systems for the HEALTH of those systems.
Healthy networking, and applications, and file formats, make new (generally PROPRIETARY) applications and approaches feasible. Think growing the industry. Without a good basis you are just building on quicksand.
Imagine if the internet was switched over to Windows 2000 (domain controllers and all)tomorrow. Can you imagine how much damage would be done? Cost, performance, reliability, hardware. Users would go back to floppy disks. It would be a complete disaster.
Open source (free software, whatever) is GROWING THE INDUSTRY. Proprietry software takes advantage of the new opportunities it creates. Programmers make _more_ money, not less.
--Molochorridus (think technology, not money)
If your attitude is "once I get paid to do open-source, it is no longer fun, and I have commitments and responsibilities and obligations, etc..."
;-)). But thats OK, it makes interesting reading, and people can think about integrating some of the other guys code. Better that its there rather than not.
then you have a serious problem with commitment, integrity, personal responsibility, and working with other people.
People who define themselves through their work tend to think this. But there are other ways to show integrity and commitment than 9-to-5 and a yearly bonus. Like working for charity, or even developing free software for the good of humanity (I am not being sarcastic).
Business can build personal integrity and responsibility. It also can facilitate corruption and malpractise.
I tend to think of it as "do I need to get paid?". Performing work for a service is fair. Doing something for fun is also fair. Doing something for fun that benefits others is fair and good.
People who code open source want to give back something. Its the exact opposite of shirking obligation, its an acceptance of an obligation towards the community.
There are lots of half finished open source projects languishing on the web (generally the author got a job and had no time
--MolochHorridus
IT applications groups exist to develop software around company business processes. Usually these business processes are proprietary and thus Open Source code is not really an option in this circumstance, unless of course the company doesn't mind their competition knowing how they do business.
LinuxExtreme.com
If I wanted to make money writing software, I'll go work for Microsoft. CoSource? Yeah right. How long before I see ads on Altavista like this:
GET THE SOURCE -- NOW at www.msn.com
Open Source has become just another buzzword, everybodies talking about it. But besides Netscape, which `corporation' has actually gave us any interesting source code (not hidden behind 1,0000 lines of legal crap)?
It seems Slashdotters are happy when they can download their latest corel-shareware.rpm but they're the same losers who start complaining when GNU/Linux is mentioned.
Well, like all things going commercial, quality gets lost.
If an HP developer doesn't work, he gets a pink piece of paper... and HP is also behind three months. HP SAVES MONEY by outsourcing, since it wastes three months' pay on an unproductive employer that it doesn't have to send to a contractor...
I like your idea better... it's simular to an idea I had about consumers posting bounties for bug fixes and enhancements. This would use the laws of economics to ensure that the most important things get fixed first.
Personally, I think economics can have a benificial role in steering the direction of open source development. If its important enough to me, I should be willing to pay some money for it. If it's important enough to enough people, there should be a sizable reward for meeting the demand.
However, the commercialism is not needed for the OS to continue to thrive. In fact, it might prove it's downfall (with the Linux standard base still not ready). Look at FreeBSD, what do you here about it from the media? Little or nothing. Does this make it a worse OS? Does this make development go any slower than Linux? Not really, FreeBSD has enough dedicated developers too make an excellent product without generating all the media hype Linux tends to draw. I'm not saying Linux sucks, I'm saying people who only "embrace" it to make money out of it suck.
How much different is funding a Open Source project from commissioning an artist to do a public mural?
Let's say I am someone with money, and I want to put up $10,000 to have a vital piece of software written...
Let's say it's a device driver, or a codec, or maybe even a I/O library.
So I put up $10,000 of my own money. What do I get?
What if I'm not satisfied with the result?
What's more, am I forced into an open-source license? Can I request a BSD license?
Otherwise, I end up paying $10,000 for an open-source codec, device driver, or library, and on
top of that, I have to give away both the open-source, and my own closed-source product.
So I spent $10,000 and substantially increased my risk. Also, I spent $10,000 for a device driver that maybe someone else might have funded. So why not wait 1 month and get the same result for free?
Why not spend $10,000 and just hire a consultant?
Paying for open-source development just seems stupid for the vast majority of business models. What the hell does open-source have to do with say, factory robotics? (not portable at all.)
Or corporate automation (must be onsite and have deep knowledge of the business internals)
Or, why would I pay someone to develop the next Quake killer, just to have them give it away.
Or why pay at all, and just let some other idiot pay, and then leech off the open-source result?
They will be forced to use GPL you say?
Even worse.
I think CoSource and SourceXChange will end up showing the idiocy of the OSS business models.
In the end, we will see that the only two models that will work is the Support and Consultant model. But no one is going to pay for OSS product development since it makes no sense.
I might pay for someone to write an intranet app for me, since I could care less if they give it away. It's not likely to be useful to anyone else.
CoSource and SourceXchange will end up being nothing more than CareerBuilder/Monster.com style sites listing jobs for programmers who end up getting hired as consultants.
I've been proposing something similar for years, but with the numbers reversed... I can't implement it, myself, but perhaps these guys can.
SourceXchange allows a single big sponsor to write a spec and then hire thousands of programmers. My (unimplemented) Programmer's Agency would allow a single big programmer to write a spec and then solicit thousands of sponsors. Each sponsor would contribute a small amount, which would then be held in escrow by the agency until the programmer completed his spec. The agency could then take a 10% commission on the programmer's earnings. From the sponsor's perspective, the agency would seem just like a mail-order shop selling commercial software... except it would be legal to copy what you purchased -- and you'd have to wait for it to be
written before you received it. From the
programmer's perspective, the agency would gather
thousands of small software purchasers into a
single rich purchaser with diverse interests.
Why can't the same companies implement both ideas?
--Ed Kiser
I quit my job 1 year ago.
I started my own company.
I write exactly the software I want.
I got investment and I have revenue.
It's not open-source, although I have
contributed in the past.
But, I completely love and enjoy what I do.
IMHO, open-source is like a hobby. If you can't imagine or find a way to get paid to do what you love, than that's your problem. Whether open-source or commercial. The openness or closedness of something is not what makes it fun or interesting. I'm sure the engineers who build stealth bombers at Skunkworks still have lots of fun.
Don't equate commercial developer with "suits" and "cubicles" and "dilbert"
Most of the people I know of don't have cubicles, or suits, they work in gargages in Silicon Valley.
If your attitude is "once I get paid to do open-source, it is no longer fun, and I have commitments and responsibilities and obligations, etc..."
then you have a serious problem with commitment, integrity, personal responsibility, and working with other people.
Is this a symptom of generation-Y, the real *ME* generation? It's kinda like "fuck everyone. I'm going to work when I want, on what I want, and no one tells me what to do. If you don't like my bugs, fix it yourself. Open-Source lets me get away with being a lazy irresponsible person. Because I can always fall back on 'if you dont like it, you have the source to fix it yourself' "
Is this really the essence of the Slashdot community? I don't want to be obligated to anyone?
The article, as far as I could tell, did not mention dissention. What if a developer produces crap, or nothing at all? He may not get paid, but now H-P or whomever is three months behind where they wanted to be. If an H-P programmer doesn't work, he gets a pink piece of paper...
The enforcement cannot be a strongarm contract -- individual developers do not have personal attorneys, and aren't willing to risk a lawsuit for $500 - $5000.
How do coSource, etc. handle enforcement on the development side?
is it hawat that says that? (or something fairly close to that : ) )
RMS *should* be ecstatic over this.
But I don't quite understand who actually *owns* the code that is written. It seems that the sponsor, the company that pays for the service, would own the code, and thus be able to set the license. Then they would be able to change it to any license they want.
I guess that's where CoSource and sourceXchange have to guarantee that it will always be under an open source license.
However, I can think of a potential problem with this new "mercenary-like" approach to Free Software development. While I don't find anything innately wrong with being paid to do a Free Software development job - or being paid to do any programming job of any sort - this gives companies and people with money the upper hand when it comes to deciding what gets developed. True, most Free Software developers have other jobs, but when it comes to deciding between working on a "true" Free Software project and one for which you're getting paid, which a company wants - the for-pay job will probably win. It remains to be seen whether the traditional Free Software community is hurt by these developments.
Personally, I don't think this could happen - but it might. Do we really want to forfeit our independence?
Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:
At least two errors in this item. "open Source"? Nice BiCapiTaliZation.
Also, here's the correct link.
--
"Please remember that how you say something is often more important than what you say." - Rob Malda
Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:
I don't doubt that you'll see proprietary companies touting the openness of their source code if you aren't already.
And yes, "Open Source" is a buzzword.
And yes, I also hate free (beer) software disguised as Free (speech) software.
BUT, you seem to be confused on number of issues.
First, Netscape is not the only corporation to have opened its code. Cygnus, IBM, Sendmail Inc and many others have always or recently been open.
Second, your only objection to sourceXchange and CoSource seems to be that the developer makes money. What's wrong with that? No one, not even RMS, objects to developers getting paid to do what they love. The objection is proprietary "standards", secret source code and lack of Freedom.
As for quality getting lost: What exactly do you feel will lose quality? Linux? These companies aren't hiring Linux developers, they are hiring developers for unrelated, Open Source software. And even if some of them wanted things like device drivers or kernel mods, they'd have to pass Linus to be official anyway.
--
"Please remember that how you say something is often more important than what you say." - Rob Malda
The article says that at the moment, the work is only getting done if it's sexy.
Is there a danger that with mechanisms like this in place, the work will be less likely to get done unless it's lucrative?
They're hoping to encourage shareware authors to go Open Source through this system. That would be really good (lots of shareware almost does a nice job but needs that Open Source polish), but of course there's a danger that shareware authors who caught by the bandwagon would have open sourced their work for free will now wait for someone to put a bounty on it and pay them to do it.
Are there other, similar dangers? Mostly I think this is a good thing, but I'm looking for the practical downsides here.
--
Xenu loves you!
-The licenses [...] could really be anything from GPL to BSD to in your face closed source.
Yes, but I think some form of open source is more likely.
I think your potential customers are *not* software vendors. Your customers are people who want a new feature added to a pre-existing program, and most of the time that will be some open source program they are using, not one they've written and sell. Thus they will be bound by the license terms. While they conceivably could just not distribute the changes written for their needs, this will add to their maintenance costs since future versions of the base app won't incorporate the changes and may conflict. Glue logic for connecting programs might not be distributed, but that tends to be more specialized to a particular company's needs anyway.
Also, I think the emphasis on open source by the service itself will tend to make that the dominant focus of the clients; those who need closed source help have other sources. Also, companies might be reluctant to distribute proprietary software to a programmer somewhat randomly contacted over the net.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
There's no doubt that Linux is over-hyped in the media. Part of this is due to the MS trial; it makes interesting headlines for MS to have a real competitor for a change. I suppose that reporters will get bored with it eventually, just as they got bored with Java a while back, and move on to something else. But like BSD, Linux is an excellent product, and it can survive on it's own merit without all the media hype.
TedC
Not all commercial software is of poor quality, and not all Open Source software is well written. Bad programmers write bad software; whether they get paid for it is a seperate, unrelated issue.
It seems like a lot of Linux users are adopting the attitude "if it's Linux/Open Source/whatever it must be good, otherwise it sucks". A little more introspection in the Linux community would be a Good Thing.
TedC
I don't think he's kidding, the bounty-model seems to encourage a "hit-and-run" approach to programming, where solving the immediate problem is more important than long-term maintenance.
/unlike/ companies like Cygnus, who make a living on the continued support and maintenance. However, they have a problem financing new development.
This is quite
I guess what we need is to combine the two.
I don't think he's kidding, the bounty-model seems to encourage a "hit-and-run" approach to programming, where solving the immediate problem is more important than long-term maintenance.
/unlike/ companies like Cygnus, who make a living on the continued support and maintenance.
This is quite
I guess what we need is to combine the two.
This is more than just telecommuting, because the "everyone" is bigger. It's not just the programmer and the company that benefit - it's the entire open source community.
I suppose that without the open source provisions, this system devolves into a really laid-back recruiting agency.
-Mars
Here's the thing. People always use the "programmers will starve" argument against Open-Source and moving the whole industry in that direction. The thing is, they're half right. If the Open-Source model becomes the standard for the industry, those programmers who cannot adapt to it will either lose their jobs or have to take severe pay cuts.
However, there is still big money to be made. Why? Here's the deal: Open-Source has many advantages. The biggest advantage is that maintenance turnaround times are extremely high. However, Open-Source does have one flaw: initial development time, be it for a piece of software or even just a major feature being added to a piece of software, is very slow.
And that is where the money is to be made.
Why? Well, Open-Source proponents say that the initial development time does not matter. However, they're wrong: it matters. A great deal. People outside the industry care about it even if people in the industry don't. This isn't a bad thing, though, because that's where the money comes in. Imagine a company which writes only Open-Source software. Of course, you have the idea of selling support and such, but let's face it, that alone is not going to pay all the bills. It'll sustain the tech support division but it won't fund programming, especially not on completely new projects. However, what happens when that company also does consulting? That is, it is hired by others to write completely new Open-Source software or add large new features to existing software.
Why would people do this? Individuals probably would not, but businesses would. Why? Because they need software now. They can't depend on waiting for features to naturally evolve, as features do in the Open-Source model; it simply takes too long (and there is no guarantee that the feature you want will evolve at all). That is where the companies come in: what they are selling still is not the software itself. What they are selling is the ability to get that software out more quickly than would otherwise happen. It's like shipping via FedEx; you can save a lot of money by using the regular mail, but FedEx will get it there much more quickly (plus they're more reliable than the postal service).
There's money to be made in Free Software. You just have to know where to look. And ironically enough, Open-Source's only flaw is the reason you can make money from it.
Until, a year later, someone wants not just a feature addon, but a larger change that will require some architectural changes in the software. Now what ? I'm of to Bahamas and can't be reached, and noone else really has any real insight into what goes on in my code.
if they have the source, it can be done. and for sure no one person will have total mindset of the code. this is the beaut thing about oss.
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
We enable customers to recapture their long-term investment in applications written on UNIX systems for reuse on Windows NT. The INTERIX software platform allows customers to run these UNIX system applications on Windows NT. .... Wanted egcs, emacs, gnome, TeX, XView on INTERIX.
can anyone tell me (dzions - chief scientist) why i would need 'interix' emacs for instance on NT when i can get the fsf version that's already ported to native nt? i cant say the same for tex, xview or gnome but why?
it just seems a bit of a duplication of effort.
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
is it just me or do others have a mistrust of money in the development of oss? i cant see it really taking off for for small-meduim projects, but it may have a benifit for large (say a real gnu browser) or will it? with money comes some degree of organisation and rules/regs.
the bazaar method of software development has 'evolved' because it's efficeint. efficeincy in software development means software gets out faster. how can 3rd parties not but get in the way, while they sort, shuffle and haggle over their own red tape?
while i bet ppl can think of good reasons why money for os development, what about the dynamics and effects this has on efficiency of output? oss at the moment is lean and mean with as few people to guide development as possible.
imop, until there's some runs on the board, this type of 'top-down' approach will be interesting to watch, but not a powerhouse of development as some may think, in the bottom-up world of oss.
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
Debate, well, I don't know. This looks like RMS's dreams coming true. He does not take money himself for his work for FSF but all the time he's been struggling to get money into FSF so it could hire people to work on GNU.
And, just don't confuse people to think that (FSF- DFSG-) "Free Software" is not synonymous with "Open Source"...
I really love the idea of sourceXchange and coSource. For development of new software, and for quick fixes and feature additions, this is surely the way to go.
So, I start this company and get paid $100K to develop some large piece of software, say, a complete 3D modelling and rendering package a'la 3D studio + Pixar renderman.
Great, the company that neede this got what they wanted, I got paid, and everyone's happy.
Until, a year later, someone wants not just a feature addon, but a larger change that will require some architectural changes in the software. Now what ? I'm of to Bahamas and can't be reached, and noone else really has any real insight into what goes on in my code.
How do we ensure, that a program developed thru these new efforts gets maintained, or at least, keeps it's maintainers ?
This is different from the current OpenSource development, because now, people write the software because they need it themselves, or because they truely love the idea of that piece of software they are creating. For those reasons, the software that currently gets developed, is likely to have a competent and loyal maintainer or ``head of development'' for many years.
With the get-paid-to-do-X-and-getouttahere, the software is not likely to hold this key person for very long time. I see a problem in that. But how do we solve it ?
I just took a visit to LinuxMall and do not ever remember their pages quite so huge! Its mighty busy and could be distracting if I just wanted to order something. Are they trying to be a portal or something?
You can donate more than just the slotted $5 by increasing the quantity multiplier. When I ordered the cheap Debian cd, I put a good number in the donation box.
Some anonymous poster described this effect to me:
"It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the Beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed,
the hands acquire shaking, the shaking becomes a warning.
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion."
So what we have here is someone experienced in tilting back cold refreshing 16oz Jolt Cola Classics (tm) and discovered the New Improved Jolt. When the fingers hit the keyboard, the once steady hands turned into convultions of mouse clicking like behavior.
I don't know about other authors, but before I do a minute's work for any of these groups, I'd have the license stated in my contract.
It doesn't matter much who owns the code as long as the license is fair. You can't take back the BSD license or the GPL.
Don't forget the non-profits like SPI and FSF. You can fund free software through them, and write it off your taxes, too. And I think they are more appropriate stewards of free software projects than companies like O'Reilly and Associates. Given O'Reilly's recent anti-GPL agitation, a lot of free software authors would not want to do business with them. It's a shame that HP chose them for an associate.
Thanks
Bruce Perens
P.S. use bruce@va.debian.org for email, my DSL provider went out of business and thus perens.com is down.
Bruce Perens.
> All these [hardware] companies would have to
> drop their software divisions.
I'm not sure they'd miss them, either; in many cases, right now they're just playing loss-leader. Yes, they make a net profit, but often they spend more capital on the software development than they get back from it in revenue, and make it up from some of the revenue generated by their hardware.
DNA just wants to be free...
If you mean Free Speech (Software) => Free Beer, I can understand it. But the equality sign goes both ways, and IMO, `Free Beer => Free Software' is wrong. I think much trouble could be saved if the English language was a little different...
For your other arguments, I agree. Showing the source does not mean it's free, but it's an important part of freeing software. Perhaps we should get a clear definition of `open source' (even though it's trademarked), and understand that `open source' does not always mean `free' (speech).
/* Steinar */
(This comment is of course GPLed.)
One of the good things about the volunteers writing free software is that developers can come and go as their interest inspires them. A bug can be fixed or a new feature added by a newcomer just as well (?) as a member of the original core group.
I think that with these contracting arrangements new developers will not wander along and help out. The original core group (or person) will work on it until it is done. I didn't see any mention of how to compensate someone who jumps in at the last minute and fixes a bug or adds the final feature. How would the latecomer be compensated? I would guess that the core group will not change for the life of the project.
If the projects span a few weeks or months, then the group size will not have time to change. I think of KDE or Gnome where developers are more likely to come and go and contribute widely varying amounts of code to the project.
The idea that all bugs are shallow given enough eyeballs doesn't say if the eyeball that found/fixed the bug was a member of the core group of developers. A newcomer could have found/fixed it.
This may not even be a big deal, I don't know.
Your password has expired, please login to change it.
Although everything I do can't practically be open source, I have begun to add clauses to consulting contracts that explicitly allow appropriate contributions. The following is a good example. This is in force now.
"Consultant's and Company's Ownership of Intellectual Property and Derivatives"
To best further the goals of the Company, Consultant may make use of third party products or works in the design, creation, and support of the Project Deliverables. Bug fixes, modifications, improvements, and closely related additions to such third party products that do not specifically relate to the Company's business and are not Confidential Information will be property of the Consultant without restriction, and shall be considered part of the Consultant's Accumulated Know-How. An example of this situation is the use by Consultant of a so-called "open source component", where the contribution of fixes and improvements allows such components to be integrated into future versions thereby indirectly helping the Company and the development community. Consultant and Williams hereby grant to COmpany a non-exclusive, perpetual, royalty-free license to utilize the Consultant's Accumulated Know-How in connection with the development, use, operation and mainenance of Company's internet-based site. The license shall be assignable or transferable to the Company's successors by merger or consolidation, and to any subsidiaries with respect to which the Company or any such successor shall own more than 50% of the outstanding capital stock, but shall not otherwise be assignable or transferable.
Of course a few windy clauses were added to what I wrote to begin with, but you get the idea. If more consultants and employees had this in their agreements it would help Open/Free source a lot.
Stephen D. Williams
It's just like any other contract work. There have to be interviews (telephone and/or face to face), references, initial checks, and periodic reviews and checks during the course of the contract. Think of the web sites as agencies; they do the advertising and provide the virtual meeting place, but from then on, it's up to the employer and candidate.
No sane manager lets a project go from start to finish without any intermediate checkups and reviews, even inhouse projets with inhouse employees. What makes you think this would be different?
--
Infuriate left and right
As an adjective, it also means "of the Kzinti" or "from the Kzinti". Like the nicks "Dutch" or "Irish".
--JT
[This is only slightly off-topic, but since Hemos mentioned CoSource, I'll go with it. (It's also posted to the right discussion this time; first try, I posted to the wrong one.)]
Speaking of Cosource, this seems like a good time to let everybody know that I received a great response to the essay I posted earlier this year about Open-Source funding and escrow agencies. I'm currently going through the responses and preparing a second essay to make recommendations to people who want to contribute money to Open-Source development efforts. My review will include organizations such as the Free Software Bazaar and CoSource. Unfortunately, my day job keeps getting in the way, or I would have posted my follow-up sooner.
--JT (Jim Thompson, "kzinti" on slashdot)
That's the key to the whole idea, really. I hope these new sites can cooperate with places like freshmeat to publicize and fund new and promising developments. Then maybe the pointy-hairs will realize, "hey, paying programmers to develop openware is a great idea." I think it's important for the less technical-saavy employers to realize the code they're paying to have written isn't being "given away." Instead, it's being given to hundreds or thousands of other potential developers to see and use and possibly improve at no additional cost.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
Yes, that bothered me a lot also. He spends a lot of time deomonstrating a lack of understanding of what the FSF means by "free"... and all of that is just a long winded lead-up to the theme of his article: You can get paid for doing open source work. This is not exactly a new idea.
This is a very interesting concept. What it allows for, in a sense, is something of a "mercenary" subculture of programmers. Instead of paying somebody a full time salary and benefits, and dealing with all the hassles that come with hiring somebody, a company could enlist the aid of a "hired gun" to get the job done. Yes, we have contractors now, but this allows for a completely different methodology. Instead of seeking out programmers/contractors, we have basically mercenary "contracts" (bounties even) available to anybody who thinks they can get the job done. Obviously, this means there is a level of trust that:
:) God I love(d?) that game!
a) the job will get done by the developer
b) the job will get paid for by the company
This is definately a step in the right direction for the Open Source movement. Not only does it allow people to make money, at the same time it still helps to furthur the community by making sure the code is open. The peer review is also a great way of making sure that quality code is produced. Not only that, but now, if a company needs support for certain hardware for a specific OS that doesn't have it, or some similar problem, and just wants it to get done, and does not care about owning the rights to it, it can get done quickly and efficiently.
Now you too can be a merc! Just sign up, hire some nerdy thugs, and make a killing! (figuratively speaking of course)
I can't help thinking of Mechwarrior 2: Mercenaries
-[Blaine]- "'Oh dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic."
I think what people failed to notice was that this doesn't conflict at all with the FSF. This is just a way for a company to hire someone to code something that they themselves cannot. The software that was created is then relased as opensource for all to use thereafter. A suble(sic?) but important point.
Sorry to take so long to respond, but I was doing REAL work on open source projects...here goes:
I DID read the website. Besides the fact that your marketing bozoids say nothing (without some digging) about anything other than, QUOTE (from YOUR HOME PAGE): "INTERIX is the high-performance software platform for running UNIX and LINUX applications, commands and shells on Windows NT." ENDQUOTE; YOUR words, not mine.
NOWHERE in your website do you mention the terms of YOUR license, other than to say that your parent, Softway, has filed with the Open Group for Unix certification...so the only reason you DON'T want to call it UNIX is because you don't want to tick off the OG.
From the above, I infer that you will seek and market a closed, proprietary solution, making YOU the fellow that's off topic (Topic is: "Getting Paid to Write Open Source Code," not, "Advertise Your Latest Attempt to Jump on the Free Software Bandwagon!")
Doc, you can "layer" ("lawyer?") all the "personality" on top of bloated, non-scalable, broken 60's POSIX-wannabe, me-too technology you want. "micro-kernel," "macro-kernel," whatever, it still lives on top of and requires the same 20-million lines of code and 500 megabytes of kernel and required services that Microsoft wants to sell me for a minimum of $700 and you want to add $299 or more on top of! You're just going down the same path that Datafocus/MKS went down with NutCracker. The ONLY difference (besides your code, and MAYBE your "technology,"...I don't know; the source is CLOSED, so I can't examine it!) is you and Softway want to be called an "OS," rather than a "porting solution."
My rule has always been, 'If it looks like a skunk, smells like a skunk, and has two white stripes down the back, I don't need to be squirted to know that it STINKS and I better stay away;' or as my late father might have said, "Son, I don't believe that little black-and-white striped doggie is gonna hunt." (SMILE)
As for "knee-jerk," "valid," and "troll:" well, I may have done bad things in my life, but I'VE NEVER ADVERTISED ON SLASHDOT BY POSTING TO THE FORUM. If you're gonna advertise, pay the blockstackerz and get a banner!
As for "justifying Interix," you won't here, because you CAN'T. It is proprietary, closed and built on a failing operating system built for 286's. If you want to "support" and not suborn the community, pay for a REAL operating system, don't sponsor a "Bounty Hunt." Sponsor a Project, then release the source to the community.
Otherwise, just slink away and join the rest of the clueless PHB's and marketing know-nothings that joined our community only when Linus made the front page of Forbes. The rest of us have been laboring unnoticed here in the trenches since '92 and code for and operate with TRULY open minds...focused on OPEN SOURCE.
By the way, my original comment was meant as a humorous riposte to your obvious off-topic advertising of a closed, commercial product on a thread about Open Source Software and its future. I posted it with my tongue firmly planted in my cheek. The fact you couldn't read that into the post, shows that maybe you're spending too much time around the marketing and VC guys and not enough time coding, Quaking and enjoying life with the rest of us. Or, maybe there's no room in your "personality," on top of all that bloat for humour? (Ummm, Doc; calm down...another joke.)
Doc, in calling my humorous observation "knee-jerk" YOU made it personal and elicited the "ad hominem" attacks. I don't "troll," but that was an opportunity too good to miss.
/.
No, I don't reserve my "bile" and "venom" for the Dark Lords of Redmond. They do it to themselves, every time a departmental server has to be cold booted after a BSOD or to alleviate the leaks in memory.
I don't go after Sun for Solaris, (although I _DO_ for Java! heh-heh) because they released the source code for me to examine in order to determine if it is safe to run my and my customers critical applications on (ever hear of "Free Solaris"?
I could care less about the licenses, GPL, LGPL, artistic, whatever. I want to see the source, to determine the stability of the system. I want to compile the kernel myself, with only the services I want and need. I don't want to have to guess at how to interface the tools I write and the apps my customer depends on to an impossibly convoluted mess of spaghetti that even the "manufacturer" admits few if any of their "artisans" understand.
As to "porting" Unix and Linux apps to NT, I ask you _WHY_? Why do you "...enable customers to recapture their long-term investment in applications written on UNIX systems for reuse on Windows NT. The INTERIX software platform allows customers to run these UNIX system applications on Windows NT." Why would I, as an ISV or corporate user use your product, instead of serving data in an agreed, standard format, over the network, to stable, dependable platforms, whose users do not have to worry about data loss due to constant GPF's? Why would I bother to gamble on your solution, when everyone who has tried this before (including Mortice Kerns) failed miserably? It's not their (or your) fault. NT is suitable for OpenGL games and small, departmental applications. It doesn't scale, it crashes frequently and it leaks like the Titanic after the iceberg hit.
If you want to hunt for new code mercenaries and pay them $1000 to "port" open source apps to your system, more power to you. Just don't gloat about getting off so cheap. At least not here.
A better use of your $1000 would have been to give it to maddog's Linux International (to which MY parent company belongs) or to one of the fine Project Teams seeking to expand Linux (yes, even Caldera, and let's not forget SUSE, RedHat, and all the rest who distribute "closed" apps in their distros, but have OPEN KERNELS).
I do read your comments: in defense of the IEEE, and (thankfully) of Rob's right to advertise here on
Again, _YOU_ made it personal...don't want to see comments like my initial one in this thread? Then use the 'Slash' the way Rob designed it and set your user profile to screen everything under "1". Either that, or don't accuse someone of "trolling" or "kneejerk" reactions and expect not to get called on it.
Now, will you answer my question about what is different in your solution from NutCraker? Will you tell me WHY I need to port to NT, when I can just share the data?
Traditionally free software projects have been paid for with peer respect and reputation. Open source generally preserves this. The problem has always been fuguring out how to use peer respect for grocerys. This system has the potential to solve that.
A project sponsor would probably consider the reputation of the bidding developers, and provide qualified ones with sample hardware. For example, almost any ethernet adaptor vendor would probably be willing to give a new card to Donald Becker.
SourceXchange is undoubtedly a better idea than it first seems -- and not just for the money, or even the reputation of Linux/BSD.
... and THEY are the ones keeping us fat.
Sure, SourceXchange will eventually become "the WD-40 for open-source development." Since, after all, what in a "new" program is really NEW? It's like asking a songwriter what in his/her song is original -- same language, new twists and turns, further propegation (sp?) of this new paradigm.
I'm not at all against hackers getting paid for their craft, but I REALLY like the aspect of peer review -- which is no longer an unspoken commandment of open-source. Sure, we all know it's there; but THEY do not
"He who questions training trains himself at asking questions." - The Sphinx, Mystery Men (1999)
The author of this article hopelessly confuses the meaning of "free software". He quotes a lot of Stallman to explain the slight ideological differences between "free software" and "open source", but then continues using the word "free" in the gratis sense to draw a comparison between "free software" and the software that these two companies are trying to help people create. Unless I greatly misunderstand the qualifications to be "open source", the products created under these kind of contracts will be "free software", and also will be free (gratis) to all who want them. The monetary transaction involved is to have the software created in order to sell services or add value to existing proprietary software.
Perhaps the best way to get some of this stuff funded would be through small donations from a large number of users who, unlike corporations, aren't worry about competitors.
I see this as (necessary?) steps in organizing the community, and I think there will be some growing pains in making it a success:
... debate ... over this.
/. reader, but the mass media doesn't make a distinction. I think it is important to continue to define the differences, so that the communities involved are not confused by the public.
It will be especially interesting to see how all this goes down with Richard Stallman and the Free Software stalwarts.
I don't recall hearing anything (yet) from this corner. I imagine there will be some
Whatever disagreements may persist between RMS and others in the often fractious movement he
started, the difference between Free and Open is now clear. The two can no longer be mistaken for
synonymous, and companies looking for open source development don't need to stumble over the F
word.
Perhaps it is clear for the discerning
often a great idea would come up and somebody would say, "Oh it would be really nice if somebody
worked on this." But because it wasn't really sexy, or because it wasn't an overnight hack, it would just go undone.
This is always going to be a significant problem. Not just for specific projects, but for
things like documention and quality control / testing. People may want to code it, but do
they want to take the extra steps to make it maintainable? This is an area I didn't really see addressed in the article.
Yes maybe this is a problem ! That's why these intiatives need quite a lot of Marketing, and Education, corporations need to be educated about the beneficts of Open Source, and understand the vertues of Co-petion.
The classical reaction of a corporation is to say, Hey why I am going to give a free ride to a competitor, which in fact might happen, the corporation must be shown then she can grab many other side beneficts the beneficts of Open Source.
Check out qmail. I've heard that it is much easier to deal with than sendmail.
Thad
The Bolachek Journals
Sure, we are wraping some additional process
around it, but this is at the core just
telecommuting. I know freelancers who have been
doing this sort of thing for years. One of them
consults for a company in Chicago but does all
of the work from another city. The company does
no have to provide office space or a computer.
The consultant does not have to relocate his
home and then fight rush hour every day...
Everyone wins.
The Bolachek Journals
Of course if you don't actually get paid for ;)
writing the software, you just got to make the
application obfuscated enough that in order to
use the product it's necessary for users to buy
the 1000 page tome you wrote for O'Reilly.
[ Sorry, but Sendmail is really giving me grief
at the moment. 1000 pages! for goddsake... ]
--
Rare Window - free your photos
after seeing a score 5 post listed as troll, it looks like the good goddess eris is afoot... or there are bugs to kill.
makes me smile and laugh... this is almost as funny as this post by a AC, then read the Deliciously recursive reply...
nmarshall
#include "standard_disclaimer.h"
R.U. SIRIUS: THE ONLY POSSIBLE RESPONSE
nmarshall
The law is that which it boldly asserted and plausibly maintained..
--Colonel Burr 1783
this is a good thing. it is the next itteration towards
*associations* which will mediate an intelligent distribution
of the needs of producers, and the interests of consumers.
--| open source associations |-----
Where 'supply and demand' are the determining factors, there the
egoistic type of value is the only one that can come into reckoning.
The 'market' relationship must be superseded by associations
regulating the exchange and production of goods by an intelligent
observation of human needs. Such associations can replace mere supply
and demand by contracts and negotiations between groups of producers
and consumers, and between different groups of producers...
Work done in confidence of the return achievements of others
constitutes the giving of *credit* in social life. As there was once
a transition from barter to the money system, so there has recently
been a progressive transformation to a basis of credit. Life makes it
necessary today for one man to work with means entrusted to him by
another, or by a community, having confidence in his power to achieve
a result...
A healthy system of giving credit presupposes a social structure
which enables economic values to be estimated by their relation to
the satisfaction of men's bodily and spiritual needs. Men's economic
dealings will take their form from this. Production will be
considered from the point of view of needs, no longer by an abstract
scale of capital and wages.
Economic life in a threefold society is built up by the cooperation
of *associations* arising out of the needs of producers and the
interests of consumers. In their mutual dealings, impulses from the
spiritual sphere and sphere of rights will play a decisive part.
These associations will not be bound to a purely capitalistic
standpoint, for one association will be in direct mutual dealings
with another, and thus the one-sided interests of one branch of
production will be regulated and balanced by those of the other. The
responsibility for the giving and taking of credit will thus devolve
to the associations. This will not impair the scope and activity of
individuals with special faculties; on the contrary, only this method
will give individual faculties full scope: the individual is
responsible to his association for achieving the best possible
results. The association is responsible to other associations for
using these individual achievements to good purpose. The individual's
desire for gain will no longer be imposing production on the life of
the community; production will be regulated by the needs of the
community...
All kinds of dealings are possible between the new associations and
old forms of business--there is no question of the old having to be
destroyed and replaced by the new. The new simply takes its place and
will have to justify itself and prove its inherent power, while the
old will dwindle away... The essential thing is that the threefold
idea will stimulate a real social intelligence in the men and women
of the community. The individual will in a very definite sense be
contributing to the achievements of the whole community... The
individual faculties of men, working in harmony with the human
relationships founded in the sphere of rights, and with the
production, circulation and consumption that are regulated by the
economic associations, will result in the greatest possible
efficiency. Increase of capital, and a proper adjustment of work and
return for work, will appear as a final consequence...
Exerpted from: Rudolf Steiner, *Capital & Credit*
http://home.earthlink.net/~johnrpenner/Steiner-
I think this is a truth of programming regardless of open source issues.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
There are two kinds of projects, interesting ones and uninteresting ones (valuation is, of course, based on personal preference). I don't know about most people, but money alone won't get me to work on a project I find uninteresting, and I'd like to think that is a common trait among the current crop of open source developers. We prefer interesting work, we will do it at no cost, and we will make the source free. If someone want to pay for our time, we should be that much more willing to direct our attention to things we find interesting. Ultimately, we end up supporting ourselves with "work" we enjoy. Oh, the horrors!
This seems to be yet another case of Slashdot reporting old news. We at Subsume Technologies have been trying to get the boat floating in the "pay for your open source" movement since last year.
Put quite simply, nobody seems to be eager to to give funding to projects that may potentially help a competetor, regardless of the benefits of the open source model. For some reason, it is OK to buy the same word processor as your competetor if it comes from Microsoft or some other closed-source shop, but the second you want to release the source, they think they're just giving a free ride to someone else, which doesn't sit well with them.
We've taken pitches for software a company wants implemented, we've given pitches to companies for software they need implemented, and we've done software in advance in hopes of finding the market that will support it. In all cases, the mention of our intention to make the source open has been met with massive resistance.
In short, it simply won't fly. The market is not yet ready to contribute to the open source movement, they are only ready to plunder the works that already exist. It will be a good five or ten years before the more clueful companies show enough benefits to topple the old model of proprietary computing.
The important thing is to break down larger projects into smaller components. Cosourcing works best for modules that can be worked on independently, and many efforts can be going on in parallel by different people/groups.
For example, We won't have a single project called "KDE" on Cosource.com. What we will have is a folder called "KDE", with lots of different projects in it, like "Add a CTERM(Rate, FutureVal, PresentVal) spreadsheet function to KSpread".
Thanks,
Bernie Thompson
Cosource.com
As has already been suggested, make a new contract with the same person or someone else.
In many cases, the projects on CoSource will be ones of interest to more than one party: Several companies want a product to be created, and get a developer to create it. Later, a different company who has begun to use the program needs a new feature or a bug fix. So maintenance and development could be separated, and in this case, is already separated.
No. It's something awfully close to Unix (but we're not allowed to apply that trademarked adjective to our product... yet).
It just happens to be another personality layered on top of the microkernel at the heart of Window NT.
I'm not going to justify Interix here. The website does a good job of it, and that's not what slashdot is for, anyway. If you've an open mind, read the web site. If you lack that open mind, go away and do not troll here.
- Jason
You're kidding, right? Cygnus makes a very healthy living supporting OSS; stuff they've written, stuff other people have written. If a program is important (e.g. egcs) to some company's business, they'll pay someone, anyone, to provide it.
Use cosource/sourceXchange/any-other-means to tell the same community "I'm willing to pay someone to support this code". Or develop your own expertise and support it yourself.
Compare this to the proprietary source model. The vendor assumes that, if you want the product, you also want some low level of support; the cost of that low level of support gets into the price of the product. The vendor then sets a higher level of support and charges another fee to obtain that level, adjusting the level and price until profit is maximized.
In the cosource/sharedXchange model, there are no assumptions. Desire for and willingness to provide support are made explicit; an efficient market in "what does support mean to you?" evolves. I can see some people bidding $x each for "fixes to these ten bugs"; I can see other people bidding $10x for "fix any bug I can reproduce for you within 5 working days".
None of the above is profound; it's been said before, and amply demonstrated, by Red Hat, and Cygnus, and a whole lot of other people and companies.
Last year my company sponsored what we called a "Linux Bounty"; we identified a dozen or so Open Source applications that we wanted ported to our operating system. We put dollar amounts on each and set up some simple rules:
- First acceptable implementation gets paid
- We decide what's acceptable
- We'll update in real-time a list of projects for which we have received implementations
- Whatever copyright terms applied to the original source base applied to the submitted code
We got a half-dozen implementations; for those which were useable, we paid. The most expensive item cost me $1000 out of my budget, and was cheap at the price.The biggest unanswered question about sourceXchange indeed lies in the matter of peer review. If I'm going to write a check for a few grand, I'm going to want to have some degree of trust in the technical judgement of the person or persons deciding if the submitted work meets the requirements. I expect I'm going to have to write wickedly precise requirements with respect to coding standards; things like "no compiler warnings beyond those generated by the starting source base", etc. Things that I need guaranteed if I'm going to be able to support the resulting software.
All in all, though, I expect to be a sponsor of a variety of projects. Start small, work my way up as I gain trust in the process. I don't like the idea of starting small; it will cost me time I can ill-afford. But it's the only way to mitigate the risks involved with someone else making an accept/reject decision on my behalf.
Jason
This is a great idea whose time has indeed come. Some posters have argued that this is just like telecommuting or contracting and others decried the notion that programmers will be getting paid, claiming that this is not "free" or "open". More reasonably, some have expressed a worry about what license the projects would be released under.
I believe that Open Source is what makes these schemes possible and different from a simple contracting agency. The understanding that the project is to be released under an open source license affects the dnamics of the sponsors and the motives of the developers, as well as lubricating the entire process.
First, Open Source allows a group of users, who want the software for its use value and not as a product to resell, to come together and pool funds for the development. Sure, there will be free riders, but they only get to sit and watch the scenery go by.
Second, developers like to work on open source projects. The reason I would rather work on an Open Source project is the ethical motive that my source will be free for use by everyone and not hoarded to extract a price, whether I get paid for writing it or not. I do want to earn a comfortable living and welcome this chance to be able to do so while developing Open Source.
Third, the bidding and collaboration arrangements suggested by these sites are made far more practical by an Open Source license because there is no need to keep the project strictly confidential, and because of the very large pool of potentially reusable code.
Thank you
Pavlos Papageorgiou
pavlos@spamblocker.voxar.com
Sore sex-change?