Reading 08: The Noosphere

Readings

The readings for this week are:

  1. Homesteading the Noosphere

Optional

  1. For the love of open source: Why developers work on Linux and open-source software

  2. Microsoft: we were wrong about open source

Reflections

In this essay, ESR discusses the culture and customs of the open source community:

Cultures are adaptive machines. The open-source culture is a response to an identifiable set of drives and pressures. As usual, the culture's adaptation to its circumstances manifests both as conscious ideology and as implicit, unconscious or semi-conscious knowledge. And, as is not uncommon, the unconscious adaptations are partly at odds with the conscious ideology.

For this upcoming week, you are to consider the following questions as you perform the readings and participate in class:

  1. Considering ESR's analysis of the open source culture and customs, what drives people to participate in open source? What benefit do they derive in giving away their code?

  2. What do you make of ESR's list of taboos:

    • There is strong social pressure against forking projects.

    • Distributing changes to a project without the cooperation of the moderators is frowned upon.

    • Removing a person's name from a project history, credits, or maintainer list is absolutely not done without the person's explicit consent.

    Considering open source history, do these ring true? Are these good taboos or norms for the culture to have or do they violate the spirit of open source?

  3. This semester we've discussed the idea of what a hacker is and whether or not you consider yourself one. Considering ESR's description of the gift economy and the role of reputation, do you find these mechanisms and motivations appealing? Do you view participation in open source as a means of "ego satisfaction" or something more? What would entice you or motivate you to participate?

Note, you should not simply list the questions and answer each one directly. Instead, the questions are there to help you brainstorm about the question:

What motivates or drives people to contribute to open source? What prevents people from doing so? What is required to sustain a healthy community?