Is the open source business model broken, or can it fix public education?
Posted on December 2, 2008
We at 20/20 Vision are huge fans of Open Source. Both the concept and its implementation challenge our assumptions about how to refine and scale education reform, community development, justice generally, youth leadership, business ventures, publishing, and more everyday. That’s why this caught our eye this morning, from Wired magazine editor-in-chief Chris Andersen:
Stuart Cohen, a software company CEO, argues that the freemium business model of open source software—give away the code, charge for the support—is broken because open source software is so good it doesn’t need much support. Putting aside whether that’s true or not, he defines “broken” as “not meeting investor expectations.” An alternative view is that investor expectations for open source software business are unrealistic, and the benefits are felt mostly in cost savings by the users, not revenues to the creators.
Imagine that: delivering on our promises so well that we can’t charge people to redo what we said we’d do in the first place. That doesn’t sound like a problem. It sounds like a solution to lots of entrenched problems.
For those new to the concept of Open Sourcing, here it is in a nutshell. In the early 1990s, upstart computer programmers discovered that the best way to solve common problems with the then-emerging Internet technology was to collaborate with others who shared an interest, but lacked the necessary time and resources to solve the problems on their own. “Open source” refers to their practice of allowing anyone, including potential competitors, to view and even improve upon source code – the underlying instructions that make computer software work – by making the code publicly available online, and permitting potential users to download the software for free. This radical departure from business-as-usual fueled the development of the World Wide Web, and its innovations empowered the information age in which we now live.
On the Internet platform it helped create, Open Source methodology has evolved beyond just programming practices to social networking, content creation, media production, political campaigning, publishing, and even commerce. The big idea animating our work these days: that open sourcing education reform might actually transform public education in America before this fall’s first graders graduate high school in 2020.
» Filed Under education reform, innovation, open source
