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Presentation: To Open Source Or Not, That Is the Question, SCU, 2012-09-20

This is the presentation material for the talk on "To Open Source Or Not, That Is the Question" at Santa Clara University, 2012-09-20. Peter Thoeny prepared this talk as food for thought for companies who consider open sourcing some of their software.

Presentation View the slides of this presentation.

See also: What is TWiki, TWiki presentation, public TWiki sites, TWiki screenshots, TWiki.org Blog


   Copyright © 2012 by TWiki.org. This presentation may be reproduced as long as the copyright notice is retained and a link is provided back to http://twiki.org/.  

Start Presentation

Slide 1: To Open Source Or Not, That Is the Question

open-source_or_not.gif

Presentation for Santa Clara University, 2012-09-20

-- Peter Thoeny - peter09@thoenyPLEASENOSPAM.org - TWiki.org

Slide 2: About Peter

  • Peter Thoeny
  • CTO and Founder of TWiki, the open source wiki for the enterprise, managing the project for 14 years
  • Wikis for Dummies cover Invented the concept of structured wikis - where free form wiki content can be structured with tailored wiki applications
  • Recognized thought-leader in wikis and social software, featured in numerous articles and technology conferences including LinuxWorld, Business Week, Wall Street Journal and more
  • Graduate of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich
  • Lived in Japan for 8 years, developing CASE tools
  • Now in the Silicon Valley for 14 years
  • Co-author of Wikis for Dummies book

Slide 3: Agenda

  • Crowdsourced Wikipedia
  • What is TWiki?
  • TWiki Open Source Community
  • Open Source: Rewards and Risks
  • Commercial Open Source
  • Open Source Licenses
  • Dual Licensing
  • Open Source License vs. Copyright vs. Brand

Slide 4: Crowdsourced Wikipedia

  • Wikipedia: Wiki + Encyclopedia Wikipedia
  • A free encyclopedia written collaboratively by you
  • Project started in January 2001
  • The most active public wiki: 4,000,000 articles and 14,000,000 registered users in the English language Wikipedia alone (ref. Wikipedia statistics)
  • Anyone in the world can edit any page.
  • Doesn't that lead to chaos?
    • Domain experts contribute
    • Well defined policies for contributing and handling content
      • ALERT! BUT: Reality of edit wars, and larger interest groups overpowering smaller groups
    • Graffiti gets removed quickly (many eye balls; rollback available)
  • Content can be freely distributed and reproduced under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL)

Slide 5: Wikipedia Contributions = Open Source Principals

  • Publish early and often
  • Democratic and open: Anyone can contribute
  • Robust: Mistake happen, can be fixed quickly
  • Scale: Domain experts
  • Quality: Peer review

  • What else? Let's talk!

Slide 6: What is TWiki?

  • TWiki is a wiki engine and wiki application platform, established in 1998
  • TWiki is specifically built for the workplace
  • Large number of TWiki Extensions: 200+ actively maintained extensions
  • Open Source software (GPL) with active community, hosted at http://TWiki.org/
  • 4,000+ downloads per month, 600,000 total downloads, estimate 50,000+ installations, 130+ countries
  • Est. $27M of human capital invested (ref. Ohloh)
  • Source Forge 2009 "Best Enterprise Project" Finalist (among 230,000 open source projects)

Slide 7: Competitive Landscape of Wikis & Enterprise 2.0

competitive.png

Slide 8: Enterprise 2.0 & Structured Wiki Applications

landscape6.png

Slide 9: Example: Sales Pipeline Tracker

screen-clientdb6.png

Slide 10: TWiki Open Source Community

Slide 11: Evolution of TWiki.org Community Governance

twiki-org-gov-model.sketch.jpg

Slide 12: TWiki.org Code of Conduct

foot_circle_Mombasa.jpg

  • Be considerate.
  • Be respectful.
  • Be collaborative.
  • When you disagree, consult others.
  • When you are unsure, ask for help.
  • Step down considerately.

Slide 13: The Right To Fork

  • Software fork: Developers take a copy of source code from one software package and start independent development on it, creating a distinct piece of software.
  • Fork as development branch, vs. split in the developer community.
  • Friendly fork vs. hostile fork.

  • Free and open source software:
    • Right to fork from the original development team without prior permission without violating any copyright law.
  • Commercial software:
    • Fork happen too (e.g. Unix)

Slide 14: Open Source: Rewards and Risks

  • Rewards:
    smile Fast pace development
    smile Innovation
    smile Scale
    smile Serendipity
    smile What else? Let's talk!

  • Risks:
    frown Community build-up => "Art of Community" book
    frown Quality => Community governance, release process
    frown Less control => Community governance
    frown Trolls => Community governance
    frown What else? Let's talk!

Slide 15: Commercial Open Source

  • ubuntu-debian.png Commercial open source[1]
    • vs. community open source
  • Model of Fedora/Red Hat, Zimbra, MySQL
    • vs. Debian, PostgreSQL, ...
  • Criteria for success:
    • Market share, pace of innovation, health of community


[1] The Commercial Open Source Business Model by Dirk Riehle

Slide 16: Open Source Licenses

  • Princpal: License to make the source code of software available for everyone to use, review & modify.
  • Free: Free to use, modify and redistribute without having to pay the original author.
  • Commercial use? Some licenses allow commercial use.
  • Open Source Initiative (OSI): Approves open source licenses

Slide 17: Dual Licensing

  • Definition: Release the same software under two (or more) licenses.
  • Prerequisite: Only works if company owns 100% of intellectual property.
  • Example: MySQL

  • Business model:
    • Release software under GPL
      smile Free distribution
      smile Build brand
      smile Serendipity
    • Release same software under commercial license
      smile No GPL contamination
      smile Revenue for vendor & customer

Slide 18: Open Source License vs. Copyright vs. Brand

opensource-400.png

  • Open source license: What you can do; how you can redistribute the software.
  • Copyright: Who owns the intellectual property of the software.
  • Trademark: Who is allowed to use the brand name for commercial purposes.

Slide 19: Questions & Discussions








This presentation: http://bit.ly/twPres12

(http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/view/Codev/TWikiPresentation2012x09x20)

Slide 20: BACKUP SLIDES - TWiki I/O Architecture

twiki-io-architecture.png

Slide 21: Role of Wiki Champion

  • A wiki champion is a person who:
    • understands the process of the work for a given project or business (the domain), and
    • knows how to use a wiki (best practices in collaboration)
  • The wiki champion is coaching the employees
    • Advocate, important role especially in the initial phase of a wiki
  • Typically a part time role
  • As the wikis gets larger and grows laterally, new wiki champions emerge

Slide 22: Initial Deployment of a Wiki

  • Plan content and rollout
    • Pain killer vs. vitamins
  • Build initial structure
  • Populate initial content with help from early adopters
  • Initial rollout with smaller group
  • Train and coach users Quick growth after slow start at Wind River
  • Do not underestimate inertia and time
  • Expect quick growth after slow start

Slide 23: Be Aware of Mental Barriers

  • Wikis can be intimidating; the wiki pages appear "official" and corporate
    • Overcome your own internal resistance to edit existing content
    • Paradigm shift: Content is owned by team, not individual
  • I want my contributions to be near "perfect"
    • It is more effective to post content early and let the team provide feedback and revise it iteratively

Notes

   Copyright © 2012 by TWiki.org. This presentation may be reproduced as long as the copyright notice is retained and a link is provided back to http://twiki.org/.  

See also: What is TWiki, TWiki presentation, public TWiki sites, TWiki screenshots, TWiki.org Blog

-- PeterThoeny - 2012-09-20

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