[Hampshire] Open source communities survival during economic…

Hi Community

I have become increasingly aware during the past three years, how the
existence of open source software is being taken for granted - on a
number of levels.

Many industry sectors are turning to open source as a cheap alternative
to proprietary solutions. This makes a huge amount of sense. The
financial benefits can be felt very quickly.

Unfortunately - not many people; business CEO's, consultants, heads of
departments, understand where this software comes from. For the most
part, not through fault of their own. Simply due to a lack of education.
Sometimes, the ruthless minds and pressured souls of the business
person, or project manager - can not see past the latest deadline -
ever! This is not sustainable. Such are pressured organisations, that
the communication is often broken at the best of times. Training is a
luxury. Easy to see, yes, some huge corporations provide popular open
source products, as in the case of Oracle. But the bulk originates from
ordinary individuals - volunteers. Small community groups. Not so easy
to see.

I have seen significant degradation in support of open source community
developers by organisations. That does not necessarily mean coders or
distribution maintainers. Currently I am in the fortunate position where
listening helps. I have also been in hugely closed mind set places. This
is where the myopic standpoint completely precludes the logical,
sustainable model, where communities and individuals within them, are
supported.     

I work with open source every day and have done for over 11 years. I am
contributing because this model pays my wages - and most of the time I
love it. But when I see business abusing open source in so many terrible
ways, I imagine their business will probably die. The engineers are
abused, the architects, coders and so on.

This doesn't make sense. An organisation can easily gain credibility by
supporting staff that have an interest in community development. Not
only credibility, other issues can be solved by the collaborative nature
of open source community involvement; that is capitalising on normal
human behaviour. Staffing issues, publicity, creating contacts, staff
stress amongst other pressures, can be eased. Really, many people can't
get past the idea that mention of communities means communism. This
frightens me.

I sincerely hope, as I am very concerned, that for the sake of the
industries using open source, that, if they are not putting something
back, they do soon. The education must be put in place. It must have a
place, a time and a plan. Economic change is not a reason to put this
off, it is a reason to make this a priority.

Best Regards
Damian


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