"One of the most significant moments in the history of the modern software industry took place in 1998 when Netscape announced plans to release the source code of its browser under a license that would freely permit modification and redistribution. That pivotal event represents the point at which software freedom extended its reach beyond the enthusiast community and began its ascent into the mainstream. To celebrate the success of the past ten years and reflect on some of the challenges that the open-source software community will face in the future, we spoke to some of the pioneers who were there on day zero when revolution started. We want to share their perspectives on a wide range of issues, including software patents, the emerging challenges and opportunities created by cloud computing, open-source software on the desktop, the importance of interoperability, and the ongoing fight to bring software freedom to the masses."
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I get your point, and don't necessarily disagree with it, but I think the 'revolution' was that commercial companies started to see the value in what developers had been doing since the 50s.
That's a pretty significant milestone, because I think the quality and capability of OSS today is due in large part to commercial organizations pouring in code, R&D, and paid development. That they ultimately attempt (or hope) to profit from it is irrelevant, because the community in general still gains the benefit.
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It became 'mainstream' in 1957 when the first Fortran compiler was developed.
This whole silliness about a 'revolution' is confusing the widespread dissemination of computing as a whole with the widespread dissemination of freely available source code.
What happened in the 90s wasn't an "open source" revolution. It was simply that computers became cheap enough to become commodity consumer electronics.
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Open sourcing Netscape was important, of course. But I'm not sure if it was that revolutionary? It could be described more like going back to the original open source philosophy in software development.
Open source was mainstream, and also used by commercial companies already long before open-sourcing Netscape.
Also, wasn't it so that RMS started his free software movement when some commercial software (printer software etc.), that was previously open source, became proprietary and could not be modified and tweaked anymore?
From Wikipedia:
In 1983, Richard Stallman launched the GNU project after becoming frustrated with the effects of the change in culture of the computer industry and users.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_free_software
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I think this nicely illustrates Eric Raymond's contributions.
http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/wp-content/ep013.jpg
Edited 2008-04-08 05:19 UTC
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You're being unfair, he is doing a lot of actual work in Free Software projects, and not necessarily the most visible ones. See e.g. this:
http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/Credits
That said I don't think that the "Open Source" expression did any service to the community. As Linus uses to say, we are to closed software what science is to witchcraft. The conclusion is that we will win against closed software whatsoever, just like science won against witchcraft: not because of any particular naming strategy, but because we just make more sense.
Important consequence:
Given that we'll win anyway, we can wait.
So there is no need to make any compromise. The expression "open source" represents a compromise because it consists in hiding the freedom ideal so as to avoid scaring away narrow-minded investors who are uncomfortable with anything else than money being the ultimate goal of a project.
And about "free" being ambiguous in English, it is not a problem... as soon as one has the guts to utter the word "freedom" explicitly.
I'll give you my opinion on this group of folks who assembled in 98 discussing "strategy" and coining "open source": while they were (and some still are) making great (i.e. technical) contributions to the community, they were also "men of their time". Specifically I mean two things:
1) they didn't understand that we would win anyway, and that therefore we could afford to take our time.
2) they believed that victory could be accelerated. It cannot. Server adoption came very fast by itself, actually in 98-99 Linux had already a high share of servers so that's not thanks to "open source" which was coined in 98. What I'm really talking about is desktop adoption, and that is not coming fast at all. It's such a deep culture change, from being happy of being a mere consumer to actively self-empowering oneself through knowledge (for this is what Free Software is about). Such a deep change just can't come overnight.
But I'm digressing... just wanted to explain to say why, retrospectively, one can only smile of this group of people coining the "open source" brand in 1998 believing that would help.
Edited 2008-04-08 07:26 UTC
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I have no idea who you think is 'we' or why you think it's inevitable that 'we' will win, but proprietary software isn't going away in my life time or yours, and if it does it'll be because of something that has nothing to do with the availability of open source.
It has nothing to do with "freedom" and everything to do with people wanting that which they'd rather pay for than implement themselves, and that's an aspect of human nature that's been with us since people have had the ability to produce more than they needed for their own consumption, probably 6000 years ago.
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What's happening today in computing is no different than what's happened over the last fifty years in computing, beyond the hardware having become cheap enough to make computing ubiquitous.
Proprietary software houses are always changing their business model as the sweet spot changes, but that, too has nothing to do with 'freedom' and everything to do with economics.
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A good look back at how far open-source / free software has come, and the challenges ahead.
On the topic of promoting OSS / free software, "OpenBSD Journal" has a good (and entertaining) article on "How to win with OpenBSD", but the general approach used is applicable to the other BSDs and Linux as well.
Here's the link - well worth a look -
http://undeadly.org/cgi?action=article&sid=20080401170716
Edited 2008-04-08 08:43 UTC
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If I am to believe this then I must have been dreaming during the late 1980's and early 1990's when I collected and duplicated the Fred Fish Disks for the Amiga. And yes, I knew a number of the programs were used for commercial/industrial use. And yes, those programs came with source.
I must have been dreaming too in the early 1980's when I help supply copies of Commodore's Educational Series to dozens of schools and thousands kids. And yes, the copying was done for free, and teachers were always telling me about improvement they made, and shared between schools.
I must have been dreaming even in the late 1970's when I went to the TPUG meetings and gave/received free program listings.
FreeWare has existed for almost as long as computers have. And Freeware is free far more than GPL code is.