Boldly Open

If you have been living in a cave, or just taking a few days off as I did, you might have missed the rant from Zed Shaw, of Mongrel fame. Parental advisory applies: if you don’t like strong language, and if you don’t understand what rants are really about, you should probably steer clear from that page. But if you care about IT, Open Source communities and the issues around the crazy and stupid consulting world, Zed’s post is a must read. It’s a long read, but once you filter the swearwords and the bile out, the distilled information is definitely useful stuff.

I don’t subscribe to most of it, and I definitely think he went over the top even for a rant, but they guy surely has a few notable points and is clearly able to show how, in may ways, our industry sector sucks. More to follow.

I saw it coming. First Marc Fleury comments about Apachecon in his backyard, complaining about a missing invitation to attend, then Jim writes a somewhat resentful yet ironic entry, inviting Marc to follow the Apache Software Foundation business more closely, possibly putting some of his RedHat loot to good use by sponsoring Apache who, after all, has been the giant’s shoulder to stand on for a lot of JBoss business. It took just a few days and some Thanksgiving turkey for Marc to miss the afternoon football match and send another note to the blogosphere, poking more fun at Apache. The "fat ladies drinking tea" have now become a bunch of politicians hanging around as aging Star Trek fans, forgetting about code and preaching the Community gospel as if they owned the key to the Ultimate Open Source Truth.

One thing I’ll say for Marc: he’s damn good in rhetorics. A master of straw man, he depicts Apache as a group of oldies who only care about doing politics and duplicating stuff to indulge in their license talibanism. He’s not so good at fact-checking, though: a quick search at Ohloh would have shown how people like Geir Magnusson actually have bothered writing quite some code, other than helping freeing up the Java world within the JCP.  Which kinda shows how Apache really is about writing code: we just go beyond that and care about the big picture as well, and we’re lucky to have people like Geir around, who enjoy being a pain in the neck to whoever tries to circumvent our ability to build and openly develop software for the common good.

It’s no wonder Marc is getting it all wrong when it comes to Apache being duplicating code almost for the sake of it (or, better, for the sake of the BSD license). Something Matt seems to resonate with. Unfortunately, they are both missing the point: Apache has been duplicating efforts for the sake of community based development, and BSD-family licenses just happen to be an enabler for such an endeavor, as they encourage participation from a diverse number of interested parties. It’s not that GPL couldn’t work at all, but let’s look at the facts: GPL as it stands nowadays is far from being a collaboration platform. Commercial Open Source is using it as a big poster sign of software built behind locked doors, with incidental help from the community but no real incentive to participate. Understandably so, to some extent: the moment software becomes a core corporate asset, the latest thing you want is someone on a different payroll to decide what your roadmap should be like. Which, in turns, brings you to MarcF camp of a world split in two: producers and consumers, suppliers and customers. To be sustainable, this old world has to rely on well-established economics, where customers pay for technologies funded and built by vendors. If that doesn’t happen, vendors have the right to whine and mope about: Open Source here is little more than marketing sugar on a granny pie.

Too bad this is as far as it can possibly get from the way Apache sees the world, which is about building a collaborative environment where diverse interests converge into building tools and software for a number of different purposes, from fun to profit (and possibly both). It all starts from people willing to scratch a common itch, understanding how joining efforts, exchanging ideas and building code  together within a neutral environment allows to solve a technical problem faster and better. It enables different business purposes, as it doesn’t really matter if you want to build Open Source software for the sake of it, if you just want to use some stuff or if you want to run an international business around it. It mirrors the collaborative world we are living, where all lines are blurred and it’s difficult to say who is a customer, who is a vendor and even what on earth the product is. This is a world of shared R&D cost, which can leverage a number of innovative economics and doesn’t necessarily have to rely on licensesubscription sales to be sustainable.

So, is Apache duplicating code? Yes, indeed, sometimes even internally (just have a look at the number of feather-decorated web frameworks).  Is that bad? Hell, no: if we were to think about distribution terms not being a reason good enough to justify duplication, quite a bit of Open Source would have to go anyway as it’s mostly about superseding proprietary alternatives. Is it suboptimal? Maybe, but the trade off between unencumbered access to the development process and mere source code availability, with right to fork as the only alternative, makes me welcome duplication. Does it always work? No, it would require a thick pair of pink glasses to claim that Apache projects have always been immune to corporate pressure and hidden agendas, yet in the long run there is little a corporate behemoth can do when confronted by peer pressure under technical and meritocratic terms.

All in all, I think I’ll stick to my Klingon lessons: Q’Apla, MarcF!

Come Celebrate the Spirit of Open Source 3-5 October in Rome, Italy!

The Cocoon community proudly invites all ASF contributors to the sixth edition of the Cocoon GetTogether, the annual gathering of the world’s foremost Cocoon users, developers, and enthusiasts.  In addition to a "conference day" on October 5th dedicated to all things Cocoon, the
event will also feature a two-day hackathon for developers to meet, greet, and collaborate in an informal environment.

In keeping with our long-standing participation with other Open Source communities, the hackathon is open to all Apache Projects (incubating ones too!) interested in getting together for a couple of days of fun. We’ll happily make room for new friends!

In addition to hacking fun, attendees are welcome to join the social activities that have been scheduled around the conference: Cocoon GetTogether evening events are all about fun — hacking, collaboration, and community-building meets local flair and flavor. Join us for stunning architecture, outstanding gastronomy, and some of the hottest nightlife available, from leisurely city walks and bus tours, to authentic pizza and slow-food hero porchetta, to sunny Nastro Azzurro and noble Nebbiolo.

The Cocoon GetTogether is considered among the best Apache community events: with tickets at just EUR125 for the full three-day program, you can’t afford to miss out!

Sign up at http://www.cocoongt.org to reserve your spot today — see you in Rome!

The speaker list is out, and the long waited acceptance email didn’t come in. My bad for providing just business-related talks: Apachecon is and should be a mostly-geek event, and the competition for the few business slots is understandably high. Time to flesh out some tech ideas for the next edition…

Looks like I’m going to miss my first Apachecon in four years: given both Ugo and Andrew have been accepted, Sourcesense is both going to be more than well represented and in need of someone at the helm, which means I will probably stay home and enjoy some local work for a change. I will deeply miss hanging around with the other ASF guys, but there will for sure be other chances to meet up. Have fun in Austin, guys!

I just realized that the first OSBC Europe is going to happen in the very same days of Apachecon EU. This sucks in so many ways: I know the target audience is somewhat different, but I really don’t think I’m the only one who was planning to attend both.

I’ve been looking with a lot of anticipation to OSBC Europe, and we were also planning to have a booth or something, yet seeing how the OSBC producers didn’t give a dime about colliding with one of the major Open Source events out there it’s not a good sign at all. I’m sure there have been plenty of good reasons to choose those dates, yet I really don’t feel comfortable in having to choose between the two, and I’m sure I’m not alone. Matt, can you share any insights about this mishap?