Open Source communities have often been looked towards with extreme views. While some of the established proprietary concerns view them as business disruptors, others see them as great democratizers. The truth however, is somewhere in between. Within the tech sector for instance, Linux started out as a competitor for Microsoft’s more bureaucratic controls, but was eventually seen as ideal for long term business innovation, so got added protection from another giant in IBM. Other open source communities such as Word-press or even Android, are tightly influenced if not regulated by their original creators, Automattic and Google, respectively. Yet others like Apache, Cloud Foundry and Spark provide another model. Collaboration is possible even outside this open sphere as done through industry bodies such as National Association of Manufacturers or the American Petroleum Institute. Consortiums such as Joint Center for Energy Storage Research provide another way. But proprietary concerns such as Apple’s iOS which is completely company owned, need to understand that once a service or platform has been designated as open source, there is very little control it can keep. Instead, it is the market and its users who then decide the course.

Source:http://innovationexcellence.com/blog/2017/12/22/how-every-industry-can-learn-from-the-open-source-movement/

Uploaded Date:19 January 2018