Someone recently asked me a few question about corporate participation in open source communities and I thought I'd share my thoughts on this topic here. Are there differences between an open source project done for a corporation and one done for personal reasons? There are many different ways to run an open source project, led by a corporation or by someone else. Some projects that are run by corporations have few outside contributors. This is often the case with projects that require copyright assignment (i.e. contributors have to assign their copyright to the corporation). These projects may not gain all the benefits of a true open source community, such as outside contributions or high levels of peer review. However, they may still be very successful projects and may have high levels of quality. Projects done by a corporation may have better planning and may have more resources than other projects. When a corporation, especially a large one, starts or becomes involves in a project it can also give credibility to the project and attract a lot of interest to the project. This means that projects done by corporations may have a bigger impact and might also be more visible in terms of publicity. How do corporations successfully utilize an open source community? Corporations can benefit from an open source community in many ways. For example, they can often find people who will review their code or make code contributions. If people become excited about what the corporation does, they might also spread the word and create viral marketing for the corporation. Establishing a community around one's project is often also a good way to identify people to hire since you already have experience working with them and know their capabilities. How do open source communities successfully utilize their corporate relationships? Corporations can make several unique contributions. For example, large corporations can use their name to attract attention to a project and give it credibility. Furthermore, corporations have some capabilities that personal contributors often don't have access. They may have special testing equipment (such as servers with thousands of CPUs or hard drives) or access to a testing lab where a professional usability test can be done. Finally, corporations can sponsor developer conferences, which are typically very effective means for the community to come together and work on activities together. It is important for projects to remember that corporations are not charities and that they will invest in an open source project for a reason. Therefore, they have to ensure that the corporation will get tangible outcomes from their involvement or sponsorship, otherwise they may not stay involved in the long run. What are the risks for a corporation when working with an open source community? One risk is that the code (or other form of contribution) is not accepted. However, this is a risk any contributor to a project faces. Before making any sort of contribution, it is therefore important to become familiar with the project and its culture. Every project has their own "do's" and "don'ts" that have to be followed. Another risk is that a corporation will invest in a community project that later on is abandoned by the community. However, in this case, the corporation could take the lead and continue to maintain the project. What are the risks for an open source community when working with a corporation? One potential risk is that the corporation will assert too much control over the project. It's important for projects to ensure that the community as a whole has influence over the direction of a project rather than one particular player. Are certain certifications needed in order for someone to participate in open source projects for a corporation? Certifications are not needed to get involved in or start a project. However, it is important to become familiar with the open source community and the project one wants to contribute to. A good first step is to read the book Producing Open Source Software by Karl Fogel which is available online. As a next step, the community in which someone wants to get involved in should be studied, for example by reading the mailing list archives. This will help to become familiar with the culture of a project as well as the mechanisms to contribute to the project. How do open source communities communicate and collaborate with corporations? In the best case, employees from corporations would interact in the project like any other contributor. That is, they should use the existing communication channels, such as mailing lists, IRC or developer gatherings. Many companies are good at working "with the community" but the ideal scenario is for a company to be part of the community and to work "in the community", just like other contributors. This is the most effective way for them to make changes to the code and project. Of course, not every corporation will get involved in a project directly. That's why it makes sense for projects to collaborate with corporations in other ways. For example, projects can talk directly to companies to get samples of their hardware in order to add support for them in their software. Projects can also work directly with corporations to find out how their project can better meet the needs of enterprise users.

Monday, May 18, 7:00pm VENUE: Courant Institute
251 Mercer Street (Warren Weaver Hall)
Room 109 TITLE: The Struggle to Build a Digital Republic ABSTRACT: David Bollier will speak about the themes of his new book, Viral
Spiral: How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own (New
Press). The book is the first comprehensive history of the free
culture movement and sharing economy that is empowering ordinary
people, disrupting markets and changing politics and culture. Bollier
will talk about the rise of free and open source software, Creative
Commons licenses, the new forms of non-market creativity (Wikipedia,
blogs, remix music, videos) as well as fascinating innovations in open
science, open education and open business models. More about the
book can be found at the website www.viralspiral.cc. More about
Bollier can be found at www.bollier.org.

Monday, May 18, 7:00pm VENUE: Courant Institute
251 Mercer Street (Warren Weaver Hall)
Room 109 TITLE: The Struggle to Build a Digital Republic ABSTRACT: David Bollier will speak about the themes of his new book, Viral
Spiral: How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own (New
Press). The book is the first comprehensive history of the free
culture movement and sharing economy that is empowering ordinary
people, disrupting markets and changing politics and culture. Bollier
will talk about the rise of free and open source software, Creative
Commons licenses, the new forms of non-market creativity (Wikipedia,
blogs, remix music, videos) as well as fascinating innovations in open
science, open education and open business models. More about the
book can be found at the website www.viralspiral.cc. More about
Bollier can be found at www.bollier.org.

Now that I am (thankfully) done teaching until September, I have time to devour two small mountains of readings that I need to finish before I return to my manuscript, which I will be working on, I hope uber-productively, all summer long. One pile of readings deals with coding, open source, and the commons, such as Scott Rosenberg s Dreaming in Code and David Bollier s Viral Spiral. Another pile of reading edges toward the theoretical side of things, having to do with craft, pleasure, and humor, since it is pleasure in its many many many guises from from the calm feeling of self-satisfaction that underlies pride in one s craft, to the more sublime feeling of ecstatic bliss that powers many creative sprints. If one entertains pleasure, one must also entertain its darker side, for all of this feel good stuff is nonetheless often springs forth from a deep sea of passionate frustration. This seems to be the driving theme of Dreaming in Code and it is also what animates Ellen Ullman s fictional account of pure frustration, The Bug. I am quite fond of native expressions of geek frustration and recently was provided with an exquisite example a rant against the Adobe PSD format. The author of Xee, A light-weight, fast and convenient image viewer for Mac OS X explained his utter contempt for the Adobe PSD in the following way:

At this point, I d like to take a moment to speak to you about the Adobe PSD format. PSD is not a good format. PSD is not even a bad format. Calling it such would be an insult to other bad formats, such as PCX or JPEG. No, PSD is an abysmal format. Having worked on this code for several weeks now, my hate for PSD has grown to a raging fire that burns with the fierce passion of a million suns. If there are two different ways of doing something, PSD will do both, in different places. It will then make up three more ways no sane human would think of, and do those too. PSD makes inconsistency an art form. Why, for instance, did it suddenly decide that *these* particular chunks should be aligned to four bytes, and that this alignement should *not* be included in the size? Other chunks in other places are either unaligned, or aligned with the alignment included in the size. Here, though, it is not included. Were it within my power, I would gather every single copy of those specs, and launch them on a spaceship directly into the sun.

Even if this account represents unadulterated irritation, he leaves us, the reader, with nothing of the irritation, only pleasure. This aftermath of frustration is delivered through the vehicle of humor, which within the hacker context, is the cultural container that best captures the spirit of hacker pleasure or so I will be arguing. Like many humorous rants from the world of hacking (and please send me any others you know of), this text dances with liveliness; it exudes its own rhythm; it glistens to use Ronald Barthes apt phrasing from his short book The Pleasure of Text, which I just finished as part of my theoretical escape into the pleasure-dome. Although there are parts of his book which are to be frank, *really* *not* *pleasurable*, partly due to obscure references to High French Theory, which elide even an academic pair of eyes, the book generally pleases. And one of the most pleasing chunks is his definition of a stereotype:

The stereotype is the word repeated without any magic, any enthusiasm, as though it were natural, as though by some miracle this recurring words were adequate on each occasion for different reasons, as though to imitate could no longer be sensed as an imitation: an unconstrained word that claims consistency and is unaware of its own insistence

In contrast to the stereotype, a string of words that enchants does so by slipping off the page to hit you squarely in the heart or the gut. Unfortunately, while academic writing steers clear of stereotypes, often trying to present the detailed singularity of a phenomena (even when conditioned by social forces), it does not exactly glisten, though there are a handful of exceptions. I think we need more texts that glisten, even if only during sections or parts of our books and articles (much like the rant helped enliven the more staid technical document). In recent years, in large part due to the influence of free software, there has been an explosion, a move toward going open access. All of this is laudable and I fully embrace it (and have gotten into some small battles over it). But without an aesthetic politics that values pleasure in reading and writing we are doomed to obscurity anyway. A move toward making our knowledge public also required a move toward thinking about the literary aesthetics of pleasure.

Now that I am (thankfully) done teaching until September, I have time to devour two small mountains of readings that I need to finish before I return to my manuscript, which I will be working on, I hope uber-productively, all summer long. One pile of readings deals with coding, open source, and the commons, such as Scott Rosenberg s Dreaming in Code and David Bollier s Viral Spiral. Another pile of reading edges toward the theoretical side of things, having to do with craft, pleasure, and humor, since it is pleasure in its many many many guises from from the calm feeling of self-satisfaction that underlies pride in one s craft, to the more sublime feeling of ecstatic bliss that powers many creative sprints. If one entertains pleasure, one must also entertain its darker side, for all of this feel good stuff is nonetheless often springs forth from a deep sea of passionate frustration. This seems to be the driving theme of Dreaming in Code and it is also what animates Ellen Ullman s fictional account of pure frustration, The Bug. I am quite fond of native expressions of geek frustration and recently was provided with an exquisite example a rant against the Adobe PSD format. The author of Xee, A light-weight, fast and convenient image viewer for Mac OS X explained his utter contempt for the Adobe PSD in the following way:

At this point, I d like to take a moment to speak to you about the Adobe PSD format. PSD is not a good format. PSD is not even a bad format. Calling it such would be an insult to other bad formats, such as PCX or JPEG. No, PSD is an abysmal format. Having worked on this code for several weeks now, my hate for PSD has grown to a raging fire that burns with the fierce passion of a million suns. If there are two different ways of doing something, PSD will do both, in different places. It will then make up three more ways no sane human would think of, and do those too. PSD makes inconsistency an art form. Why, for instance, did it suddenly decide that *these* particular chunks should be aligned to four bytes, and that this alignement should *not* be included in the size? Other chunks in other places are either unaligned, or aligned with the alignment included in the size. Here, though, it is not included. Were it within my power, I would gather every single copy of those specs, and launch them on a spaceship directly into the sun.

Even if this account represents unadulterated irritation, he leaves us, the reader, with nothing of the irritation, only pleasure. This aftermath of frustration is delivered through the vehicle of humor, which within the hacker context, is the cultural container that best captures the spirit of hacker pleasure or so I will be arguing. Like many humorous rants from the world of hacking (and please send me any others you know of), this text dances with liveliness; it exudes its own rhythm; it glistens to use Ronald Barthes apt phrasing from his short book The Pleasure of Text, which I just finished as part of my theoretical escape into the pleasure-dome. Although there are parts of his book which are to be frank, *really* *not* *pleasurable*, partly due to obscure references to High French Theory, which elide even an academic pair of eyes, the book generally pleases. And one of the most pleasing chunks is his definition of a stereotype:

The stereotype is the word repeated without any magic, any enthusiasm, as though it were natural, as though by some miracle this recurring words were adequate on each occasion for different reasons, as though to imitate could no longer be sensed as an imitation: an unconstrained word that claims consistency and is unaware of its own insistence

In contrast to the stereotype, a string of words that enchants does so by slipping off the page to hit you squarely in the heart or the gut. Unfortunately, while academic writing steers clear of stereotypes, often trying to present the detailed singularity of a phenomena (even when conditioned by social forces), it does not exactly glisten, though there are a handful of exceptions. I think we need more texts that glisten, even if only during sections or parts of our books and articles (much like the rant helped enliven the more staid technical document). In recent years, in large part due to the influence of free software, there has been an explosion, a move toward going open access. All of this is laudable and I fully embrace it (and have gotten into some small battles over it). But without an aesthetic politics that values pleasure in reading and writing we are doomed to obscurity anyway. A move toward making our knowledge public also required a move toward thinking about the literary aesthetics of pleasure.

TIME: Monday, May 18, 7:00pm VENUE: Courant Institute
251 Mercer Street (Warren Weaver Hall)
Room 109 TITLE: The Struggle to Build a Digital Republic ABSTRACT: David Bollier will speak about the themes of his new book, Viral
Spiral: How the Commoners Built a Digital Republic of Their Own (New
Press). The book is the first comprehensive history of the free
culture movement and sharing economy that is empowering ordinary
people, disrupting markets and changing politics and culture. Bollier
will talk about the rise of free and open source software, Creative
Commons licenses, the new forms of non-market creativity (Wikipedia,
blogs, remix music, videos) as well as fascinating innovations in open
science, open education and open business models. More about the
book can be found at the website www.viralspiral.cc. More about
Bollier can be found at www.bollier.org. Bio
David Bollier is a leading American activist, author, blogger and
proponent of free culture on the Internet and the commons. He is an
editor of Onthecommons.org and Senior Fellow at the USC Annenberg
School for Communication. Bollier is also co-founder of Public
Knowledge, a Washington, D.C., organization that advocates for the
public s stake in the Internet and copyright law, and the author of
Silent Theft, Brand Name Bullies, and four other books. He lives in
Amherst, Massachusetts. VENUE: Courant Institute
251 Mercer Street (Warren Weaver Hall)
Room 109

I am sure many have seen this video pirates. drugs. gay marriage and I think it speaks for itself. But I have to say, this video caught be off guard early this morning when I am first exposed to the day s viral videos, memes, and other savory and unsavory delights. Though I have been consuming and digesting this stuff for awhile now, I am still amazed by the craziness, creativity, outrageousness (often offense) that circulates every day, without fail, on the internets. Most of the stuff, even if pretty low brow can be said to be artistic in one classical sense of art: l art pour l art , with the aesthetics being focused on some combination of shock, irony, and humor. But how about the political activists? They are not dipping into this genre enough and it s high time they use start using these tactics/viral videos to shock/shame their opponents, using the sugar coating of humor and raw audacity to spread their message.

/tmp/lab announces the second Hacker Space Festival
(Paris, 26-30 June 2009) Hacker Space Festival 2009 Call For Proposals HSF2009 In 2008, we organized HSF[1] on the spot, as an ad-hoc meeting for
hackerspaces-related networks, technical and artistic research emerging
from them and social questionning arising from them. This sudden
experiment proved to be a huge success, as much as on the
self-organizing level as on the participants and meetings quality, as
well as the emotionally-charged ambient, the kind of which you make
fond memories. The 2008 edition generated a strong emulation in France, from its
historical role as the first official hack meeting there, and in Europe
with the subsequent creation of the Hacker Space Brussels[2], the
rapprochement with The Fiber in Amsterdam and the hackerspaces.org[3]
network. Initiatives of hackerspace openings in Grenoble or Lille, or
the upcoming FrHack[4] conference show an actual enthusiasm in the
French hackers community that was doomed to the underground not so
long ago. We salute these initiatives and their diversity! Soon enough, we wanted to reiterate the HSF experience : however, it
was out of the question to institutionalize this temporary autonomous
zone, nor make it an ersatz of the previous edition, nor even to wrap
it into an elite or underground aura. On the opposite, we ardently
desire; and especially to explore further, in all directions some
lesser known domains (see below) et foster meeting and sharing around
experiences at the confluence of art, technology and politics. The world financial crisis, the decay of democracy in Europe, the
obscurantism, paranoia and lack of culture presiding over legislation
(Internet and Reaction Err Creation Law[5][6]) seem a fertile
environment for the sensible development of new (social ) life forms.
Quick! Let s rest for a few days in jubilation and ecstasy to take a
deep breathe of freedom under the indelicate smells of the medicine
factory nearby! For if the public space is shrinking to oblivion, where any side-step
becomes suspect, and that, from an early age (deviant behavior
detection in nursery school), where moving without a mobile phone
becomes suspect (hello you Julien Coupat[7], a French political
prisoner in France!), there s a domain that the Leviathan would have a
lot of trouble to contain, and for a reason: that of sensitivity. Even
the desperate attempts of the State to block the free and premonitory
expression of sense (hello you Demeure du Chaos![8]) cannot do anything
against a loud laughter or a knowing glance, a sensual kiss or an
explosion of colors. Sensitivity, we could say, is what is left to a human being when she
has nothing anymore, and differenciates her from the body corporate or
the institution, that are, in essence, devoid of it. Therefore, Art
definitely remains the public space to share between humans, and only
between us. And if it the last one to share, we propose to explore it
and take it over during the upcoming edition of the Hacker Space
Festival, from the 26th to 30th of June, 2009 at Vitry sur Seine[9]. ========================================================================
Keynote Speakers: Sergey Grim and Larry Fake with Eric Schmoudt
Groogle Summer of Crode, Survivor style
VLC, I vote against you because you really fucked up when ========================================================================
== W A N T E D ========================================================= Focus on solutions rather than problems. * The Final (Hardware) Frontier: Open FPGA Cores, Reverse Engineering
* Designer Religions and Creative Beliefs Systems
* WiFiDoors & WiFi System-on-Chip controllers firmware hacking,
infection & backdooring
* Telecom Core Network Equipment Reverse Engineering: MSC, STP,
Switches,
* Algebraic Attacks and Modern Cryptography Attacks
* Autonomous, Parasitic and Viral Drones
* Enhanced or Infected Reality Swarms
* Auto-Builders / Self-Fabrication
* Embedded OS breakins stories & recipes
* Actualization rather than mere concepts
* FPGA & ASIC hacking / backdooring
* Cloud+Privacy+Open Source: O Brave New World?
* Explosion-Proof clothing
* Radio Appz & Hackz: Mesh @ RF Layer 1-3
* Database & Privacy
* Problematic & Ethical Open Source/Content Licenses
* Institutional Relationships: Lobbying or Licking?
* Non Lethal Protection (anti-taser vests?)
* Survival in the Age of the Ministry of Immigration and National
Identity
* Mental asylum improvised visit
* Open Source Legacy Media(TM) Production Solutions (TV, Radio, Press,
DRM)
* Gas Sensors & Environmental Benchmarking
* Building Hackerspaces Without Money
* Milsatcomm hacking: Military satellites shots, broken birds in the
sky
* Other research topics on security and insecurity
* Academics and Hackers
* Organics and Fermentation
* Clean Food in Tainted Environment
* Low Impact Energy & Recycling
* Media Sandwich: layers of crap makes good food?
* Deconstructing Carla Sarkozy
* Knitting DIY Factory (jazzy, eh?)
* Signs of life among industrial wasteland
* Hallucinogenic & Computing: Can you Code on Acid?
* Mesh Networking (Wireless BattleMesh Royal!)
* Legal Sabotage: When Democracy Needs You And anything that does not fit. ========================================================================
== P R O P O S E ======================================================= Send you contributions to HSF2009-CFP@lists.tmplab.org + Type of the proposal: 1. conference (45min. presentation + 10min. for questions)
2. workshop / demo (30min. 2 heures)
3. installation / performance (music, plastic, sound, video) Lightning talks can be proposed and organized until the last moment,
according to available space and schedule, in the form of BarCamps or
Blitz Conferences. + Required Information: * Title of the presentation
* Type (see above)
* Language : French or English
* Name of speaker(s)
* Affiliation (organization / company)
* Short biography
* Abstract (5 to 10 lines)
* Topics / Keywords
* Includes a demo? YES NO
* Release during the festival? YES NO
* Internet connection required? YES NO + Acceptable Formats * Open Document
* PDF
* Plain Text
* RTF + Agenda * beginning of proposals : now
* end of proposals : 01 May 2009
* selection notification : 07 May 2009
* publication of program : 15 May 2009 + Evaluation criteria for proposals: 1. Innovating Topic
2. Open Technology
3. Demonstration / Live Act
4. DIY Reproducibility
5. Fun Potential The Programming Committee resembles that of last year
See : http://hackerspace.net/committee ========================================================================
== V E N U E =========================================================== /tmp/lab
6 Bis rue Leon Geffroy
94400 Vitry sur Seine
France http://hackerspace.net/directions ========================================================================
== P A R T I C I P A T E =============================================== Email : http://lists.tmplab.org/listinfo.cgi/hsf2009-talk-tmplab.org
CFPmail: HSF2009-CFP@lists.tmplab.org
IRC : irc://irc.freenode.net/frlab
Jabber : xmpp:hsf2009@space.cepheide.org?join
Wiki : http://hackerspace.net/hsf2009 ========================================================================
== L I N K S =========================================================== The CFP is available online at http://hackerspace.net/cfp [1] http://hackerspace.net/hsf2008
[2] http://hsb.wikidot.com/
[3] http://hackerspaces.org/
[4] http://www.frhack.org/
[5] http://jaimelesautistes.fr/
[6] http://laquadrature.net/
[7] http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julien_Coupat
[8] http://www.demeureduchaos.org/
[9] http://hackerspace.net/
Philippe Langlois
Email: philippelanglois@free.fr
PGP Key: 8DAEE244

========================================================================
/tmp/lab announces the second Hacker Space Festival
(Paris, 26-30 June 2009)
======================================================================== Hacker Space Festival 2009 Call For Proposals HSF2009 In 2008, we organized HSF[1] on the spot, as an ad-hoc meeting for
hackerspaces-related networks, technical and artistic research emerging
from them and social questionning arising from them. This sudden
experiment proved to be a huge success, as much as on the
self-organizing level as on the participants and meetings quality, as
well as the emotionally-charged ambient, the kind of which you make
fond memories. The 2008 edition generated a strong emulation in France, from its
historical role as the first official hack meeting there, and in Europe
with the subsequent creation of the Hacker Space Brussels[2], the
rapprochement with The Fiber in Amsterdam and the hackerspaces.org[3]
network. Initiatives of hackerspace openings in Grenoble or Lille, or
the upcoming FrHack[4] conference show an actual enthusiasm in the
French hackers community that was doomed to the underground not so
long ago. We salute these initiatives and their diversity! Soon enough, we wanted to reiterate the HSF experience : however, it
was out of the question to institutionalize this temporary autonomous
zone, nor make it an ersatz of the previous edition, nor even to wrap
it into an elite or underground aura. On the opposite, we ardently
desire; and especially to explore further, in all directions some
lesser known domains (see below) et foster meeting and sharing around
experiences at the confluence of art, technology and politics. The world financial crisis, the decay of democracy in Europe, the
obscurantism, paranoia and lack of culture presiding over legislation
(Internet and Reaction Err Creation Law[5][6]) seem a fertile
environment for the sensible development of new (social ) life forms.
Quick! Let s rest for a few days in jubilation and ecstasy to take a
deep breathe of freedom under the indelicate smells of the medicine
factory nearby! For if the public space is shrinking to oblivion, where any side-step
becomes suspect, and that, from an early age (deviant behavior
detection in nursery school), where moving without a mobile phone
becomes suspect (hello you Julien Coupat[7], a French political
prisoner in France!), there s a domain that the Leviathan would have a
lot of trouble to contain, and for a reason: that of sensitivity. Even
the desperate attempts of the State to block the free and premonitory
expression of sense (hello you Demeure du Chaos![8]) cannot do anything
against a loud laughter or a knowing glance, a sensual kiss or an
explosion of colors. Sensitivity, we could say, is what is left to a human being when she
has nothing anymore, and differenciates her from the body corporate or
the institution, that are, in essence, devoid of it. Therefore, Art
definitely remains the public space to share between humans, and only
between us. And if it the last one to share, we propose to explore it
and take it over during the upcoming edition of the Hacker Space
Festival, from the 26th to 30th of June, 2009 at Vitry sur Seine[9]. ========================================================================
Keynote Speakers: Sergey Grim and Larry Fake with Eric Schmoudt
Groogle Summer of Crode, Survivor style
VLC, I vote against you because you really fucked up when ========================================================================
== W A N T E D ========================================================= Focus on solutions rather than problems. * The Final (Hardware) Frontier: Open FPGA Cores, Reverse Engineering
* Designer Religions and Creative Beliefs Systems
* WiFiDoors & WiFi System-on-Chip controllers firmware hacking,
infection & backdooring
* Telecom Core Network Equipment Reverse Engineering: MSC, STP,
Switches,
* Algebraic Attacks and Modern Cryptography Attacks
* Autonomous, Parasitic and Viral Drones
* Enhanced or Infected Reality Swarms
* Auto-Builders / Self-Fabrication
* Embedded OS breakins stories & recipes
* Actualization rather than mere concepts
* FPGA & ASIC hacking / backdooring
* Cloud+Privacy+Open Source: O Brave New World?
* Explosion-Proof clothing
* Radio Appz & Hackz: Mesh @ RF Layer 1-3
* Database & Privacy
* Problematic & Ethical Open Source/Content Licenses
* Institutional Relationships: Lobbying or Licking?
* Non Lethal Protection (anti-taser vests?)
* Survival in the Age of the Ministry of Immigration and National
Identity
* Mental asylum improvised visit
* Open Source Legacy Media(TM) Production Solutions (TV, Radio, Press,
DRM)
* Gas Sensors & Environmental Benchmarking
* Building Hackerspaces Without Money
* Milsatcomm hacking: Military satellites shots, broken birds in the
sky
* Other research topics on security and insecurity
* Academics and Hackers
* Organics and Fermentation
* Clean Food in Tainted Environment
* Low Impact Energy & Recycling
* Media Sandwich: layers of crap makes good food?
* Deconstructing Carla Sarkozy
* Knitting DIY Factory (jazzy, eh?)
* Signs of life among industrial wasteland
* Hallucinogenic & Computing: Can you Code on Acid?
* Mesh Networking (Wireless BattleMesh Royal!)
* Legal Sabotage: When Democracy Needs You And anything that does not fit. ========================================================================
== P R O P O S E ======================================================= Send you contributions to HSF2009-CFP@lists.tmplab.org + Type of the proposal: 1. conference (45min. presentation + 10min. for questions)
2. workshop / demo (30min. 2 heures)
3. installation / performance (music, plastic, sound, video) Lightning talks can be proposed and organized until the last moment,
according to available space and schedule, in the form of BarCamps or
Blitz Conferences. + Required Information: * Title of the presentation
* Type (see above)
* Language : French or English
* Name of speaker(s)
* Affiliation (organization / company)
* Short biography
* Abstract (5 to 10 lines)
* Topics / Keywords
* Includes a demo? YES NO
* Release during the festival? YES NO
* Internet connection required? YES NO + Acceptable Formats * Open Document
* PDF
* Plain Text
* RTF + Agenda * beginning of proposals : now
* end of proposals : 01 May 2009
* selection notification : 07 May 2009
* publication of program : 15 May 2009 + Evaluation criteria for proposals: 1. Innovating Topic
2. Open Technology
3. Demonstration / Live Act
4. DIY Reproducibility
5. Fun Potential The Programming Committee resembles that of last year
See : http://hackerspace.net/committee ========================================================================
== V E N U E =========================================================== /tmp/lab
6 Bis rue Leon Geffroy
94400 Vitry sur Seine
France http://hackerspace.net/directions ========================================================================
== P A R T I C I P A T E =============================================== Email : http://lists.tmplab.org/listinfo.cgi/hsf2009-talk-tmplab.org
CFPmail: HSF2009-CFP@lists.tmplab.org
IRC : irc://irc.freenode.net/frlab
Jabber : xmpp:hsf2009@space.cepheide.org?join
Wiki : http://hackerspace.net/hsf2009 ========================================================================
== L I N K S =========================================================== The CFP is available online at http://hackerspace.net/cfp [1] http://hackerspace.net/hsf2008
[2] http://hsb.wikidot.com/
[3] http://hackerspaces.org/
[4] http://www.frhack.org/
[5] http://jaimelesautistes.fr/
[6] http://laquadrature.net/
[7] http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julien_Coupat
[8] http://www.demeureduchaos.org/
[9] http://hackerspace.net/
Philippe Langlois
Email: philippelanglois@free.fr
PGP Key: 8DAEE244

Another Monday, start of the working week and I m thinking about business again. Ian Lynch of The Learning Machine is a smart cookie who I ve collaborated with before. He leads a free-software-based business which is very different from TTLLP s cooperative model and he gave a talk about it to Manchester Free Software. Here are the headlines:-

Building a FOSS Business

• No fees from licenses
• Services allied to FOSS
• Something everyone needs
• Low cost to produce
• Low cost to distribute
• Encourage FOSS take up
• Increase the number of FOSS contributors
• Make money to support FOSS development

Background theory and research

• Clay Christensen and the theory of disruptive innovation
• The innovators dilemma
• Seeing What is Next

Business Growth

• 3 horizons of business growth
• Horizon 1 current profitable business
• Horizon 2 business with clear potential
• Horizon 3 possibilities currently being explored
• Pipeline for growth

Tipping points

• Critical mass
• Viral effects

The ideal product

• Something everyone needs
• Something that costs nothing to make
• Something that costs nothing to distribute
• Something that has increasing value the more that is bought.

The INGOTs

• International Grades Open Technologies
• Market disruption
• Lower barriers to entry
• Target those currently not in the market
• Provide products that are good enough
• Improve and add features over time

Primary Schools - KS3

• No-one targets primary schools
• Very little certification in KS3
• Use specialist schools community plans
• Upsell from primary to secondary
• KS3 add value at with less work for teachers

Developing world

• Enable developing countries into the qualifications market
• Target those making the transition to FOSS
• Ally to netbook/smartphone internet access to lower costs
• Use UK Awarding Body status for credibility.

The above points are under a Creative Commons cc-by-sa license and the original report was at Manchester Free Software. Sometimes FSUK-Manchester produce videos of talks, but I ve not seen this one yet. Watch their page for details. What can Ian s business analysis teach us about free software businesses? What interesting questions does it leave open? Have you had anything to do with the INGOTs? I ve not worked in education for a while, so I d love to hear tales from the chalkface about them.

So I know, I know. There are a lot of annoying memes circulating on the net/facebook/[pick your spot] and well, sometimes the best thing to do is stop the damn thing by ignoring its existence. But I have to say, I have completely, totally and absolutely have loved reading the 25 things notes on facebook. It just provides a window into the extraordinary character that emerges from the collection of mundane events/likes/pleasures that make up people s lives. Reading them took me back to elementary school when and where I was an avid slam-booker. I have very fond of collecting and reading the tidbits of thoughts and information people left behind in my notebook. What also struck me about these recent 25 thingie notes is how odd or not as interesting, I think, it would be to have them recited to you over coffee or at dinner. Now I could be wrong here but I think the list-like quality would just not fly in a conversational context. A few facts with more embellishment would work but a whole string of thoughts would just sound flat and out of place. A reminder that format does matter for engendering certain types of knowledge. So here is my list.. 1. I looked like a boy for the first three years of my life (but a cute one, I think).
2. I love dogs so much that I often think that if I had a criminal streak, I would be a dog nabber.
3. I would routinely bring home dogs from the street when I was a kid. Many of them ended up dead after being hit by cars (they liked to return to the street and this only happened to 2 of them).
4. My favorite concert was Jimmy Cliff in a parking lot. There was lots of rain and lots of weed.
5. I like have a penchant for tall men. My mom claims it was because I lacked a strong father figure in my early childhood years. Who knows if that is the case.
6. I knew the instant that I took an anthropology class I wanted to be an anthropologist. I guess I made it happen (and it was one of the few moments of clarity in life).
7. I started the first environmental club in my high school and my car was called the recycle-mobile because there were always cans in the back seat.
8. I love the ocean; swimming, snorkeling, diving, sailing, and just watching it, though the cold ocean is not always by cup of tea.
9. I had terrible insomnia for a year and slept for a good chunk of it on a couch. I like the snuggle feeling I got from sleeping against a back.
10. I am very indecisive person. It is annoying as i tend to worry a lot about whether I made the right decision.
11. I was a shy kid and barely talked until meeting my best friend in kindergarten, Yael
12. I also failed the psychological test to get into school but my mom managed to get me in anyway.
13. I often wonder if I would have been a nun if I had lived prior to 1900s to escape various domestic obligations. I think it might have been fun to be a nun.. Fun to be a nun also has a nice ring to it.

14. I am currently struggling with an Etsy addiction and the UPS delivery guy asked if delivering packages would be a daily occurrence.. I just find all the stuff amazing and it brings me back to my artist days when I used to paint and spend a heck of a lot of time in the darkroom.
15. I have recurrent issues with nausea and have been hospitalized for it a few times. It is gut wrenching and really uncomfortable when it happens.
16. When I left NYC in 1997 I thought i would never come back. I am here now and quite happy.
17. I was obsessed with Ultimate Frisbee for many man years. I played more than I studied and finally gave up as it was ruining (or perhaps ruined?) my neck. I still miss it.
18. I LOVE tostones and would eat them everyday if they were not, you know, so bad for you.
19. I have been using IRC for 7 years and consider some of my best friends to come from there.
20. Some folks have asked how I became interested in politics and I am pretty sure it was Doonesbury.
21. When I was like 4 we went to some fair and I swore that I almost got flung off some rickety ride but this could be totally wrong. It was really frightening.
22. The coldest night of my life was spent in Los Nevados, Venezuela and the scariest car ride I ever took was leaving Los Nevados in a jeep and something that resembled a road.
23. A few sucker fish once tried to stick on me while I was doing a decompression stop after a dive. My dive buddy smacked the fish, which had devil faces, with the regulator, saving me from what would have been a really sort of sucky situation.
24. I am trying to learn how to surf and am really sorry that I did not do so when a teenager since I don t exactly have the time to really learn.
25. Since I am not sure how to end, I will do so with a

So I know, I know. There are a lot of annoying memes circulating on the net/facebook/[pick your spot] and well, sometimes the best thing to do is stop the damn thing by ignoring its existence. But I have to say, I have completely, totally and absolutely have loved reading the 25 things notes on facebook. It just provides a window into the extraordinary character that emerges from the collection of mundane events/likes/pleasures that make up people s lives. Reading them took me back to elementary school when and where I was an avid slam-booker. I have very fond of collecting and reading the tidbits of thoughts and information people left behind in my notebook. What also struck me about these recent 25 thingie notes is how odd or not as interesting, I think, it would be to have them recited to you over coffee or at dinner. Now I could be wrong here but I think the list-like quality would just not fly in a conversational context. A few facts with more embellishment would work but a whole string of thoughts would just sound flat and out of place. A reminder that format does matter for engendering certain types of knowledge. So here is my list.. 1. I looked like a boy for the first three years of my life (but a cute one, I think).
2. I love dogs so much that I often think that if I had a criminal streak, I would be a dog nabber.
3. I would routinely bring home dogs from the street when I was a kid. Many of them ended up dead after being hit by cars (they liked to return to the street and this only happened to 2 of them).
4. My favorite concert was Jimmy Cliff in a parking lot. There was lots of rain and lots of weed.
5. I like have a penchant for tall men. My mom claims it was because I lacked a strong father figure in my early childhood years. Who knows if that is the case.
6. I knew the instant that I took an anthropology class I wanted to be an anthropologist. I guess I made it happen (and it was one of the few moments of clarity in life).
7. I started the first environmental club in my high school and my car was called the recycle-mobile because there were always cans in the back seat.
8. I love the ocean; swimming, snorkeling, diving, sailing, and just watching it, though the cold ocean is not always by cup of tea.
9. I had terrible insomnia for a year and slept for a good chunk of it on a couch. I like the snuggle feeling I got from sleeping against a back.
10. I am very indecisive person. It is annoying as i tend to worry a lot about whether I made the right decision.
11. I was a shy kid and barely talked until meeting my best friend in kindergarten, Yael
12. I also failed the psychological test to get into school but my mom managed to get me in anyway.
13. I often wonder if I would have been a nun if I had lived prior to 1900s to escape various domestic obligations. I think it might have been fun to be a nun.. Fun to be a nun also has a nice ring to it.

14. I am currently struggling with an Etsy addiction and the UPS delivery guy asked if delivering packages would be a daily occurrence.. I just find all the stuff amazing and it brings me back to my artist days when I used to paint and spend a heck of a lot of time in the darkroom.
15. I have recurrent issues with nausea and have been hospitalized for it a few times. It is gut wrenching and really uncomfortable when it happens.
16. When I left NYC in 1997 I thought i would never come back. I am here now and quite happy.
17. I was obsessed with Ultimate Frisbee for many man years. I played more than I studied and finally gave up as it was ruining (or perhaps ruined?) my neck. I still miss it.
18. I LOVE tostones and would eat them everyday if they were not, you know, so bad for you.
19. I have been using IRC for 7 years and consider some of my best friends to come from there.
20. Some folks have asked how I became interested in politics and I am pretty sure it was Doonesbury.
21. When I was like 4 we went to some fair and I swore that I almost got flung off some rickety ride but this could be totally wrong. It was really frightening.
22. The coldest night of my life was spent in Los Nevados, Venezuela and the scariest car ride I ever took was leaving Los Nevados in a jeep and something that resembled a road.
23. A few sucker fish once tried to stick on me while I was doing a decompression stop after a dive. My dive buddy smacked the fish, which had devil faces, with the regulator, saving me from what would have been a really sort of sucky situation.
24. I am trying to learn how to surf and am really sorry that I did not do so when a teenager since I don t exactly have the time to really learn.
25. Since I am not sure how to end, I will do so with a

So I know, I know. There are a lot of annoying memes circulating on the net/facebook/[pick your spot] and well, sometimes the best thing to do is stop the damn thing by ignoring its existence. But I have to say, I have completely, totally and absolutely have loved reading the 25 things notes on facebook. It just provides a window into the extraordinary character that emerges from the collection of mundane events/likes/pleasures that make up people s lives. Reading them took me back to elementary school when and where I was an avid slam-booker. I have very fond of collecting and reading the tidbits of thoughts and information people left behind in my notebook. What also struck me about these recent 25 thingie notes is how odd or not as interesting, I think, it would be to have them recited to you over coffee or at dinner. Now I could be wrong here but I think the list-like quality would just not fly in a conversational context. A few facts with more embellishment would work but a whole string of thoughts would just sound flat and out of place. A reminder that format does matter for engendering certain types of knowledge. So here is my list.. 1. I looked like a boy for the first three years of my life (but a cute one, I think).
2. I love dogs so much that I often think that if I had a criminal streak, I would be a dog nabber.
3. I would routinely bring home dogs from the street when I was a kid. Many of them ended up dead after being hit by cars (they liked to return to the street and this only happened to 2 of them).
4. My favorite concert was Jimmy Cliff in a parking lot. There was lots of rain and lots of weed.
5. I like have a penchant for tall men. My mom claims it was because I lacked a strong father figure in my early childhood years. Who knows if that is the case.
6. I knew the instant that I took an anthropology class I wanted to be an anthropologist. I guess I made it happen (and it was one of the few moments of clarity in life).
7. I started the first environmental club in my high school and my car was called the recycle-mobile because there were always cans in the back seat.
8. I love the ocean; swimming, snorkeling, diving, sailing, and just watching it, though the cold ocean is not always by cup of tea.
9. I had terrible insomnia for a year and slept for a good chunk of it on a couch. I like the snuggle feeling I got from sleeping against a back.
10. I am very indecisive person. It is annoying as i tend to worry a lot about whether I made the right decision.
11. I was a shy kid and barely talked until meeting my best friend in kindergarten, Yael
12. I also failed the psychological test to get into school but my mom managed to get me in anyway.
13. I often wonder if I would have been a nun if I had lived prior to 1900s to escape various domestic obligations. I think it might have been fun to be a nun.. Fun to be a nun also has a nice ring to it.

14. I am currently struggling with an Etsy addiction and the UPS delivery guy asked if delivering packages would be a daily occurrence.. I just find all the stuff amazing and it brings me back to my artist days when I used to paint and spend a heck of a lot of time in the darkroom.
15. I have recurrent issues with nausea and have been hospitalized for it a few times. It is gut wrenching and really uncomfortable when it happens.
16. When I left NYC in 1997 I thought i would never come back. I am here now and quite happy.
17. I was obsessed with Ultimate Frisbee for many man years. I played more than I studied and finally gave up as it was ruining (or perhaps ruined?) my neck. I still miss it.
18. I LOVE tostones and would eat them everyday if they were not, you know, so bad for you.
19. I have been using IRC for 7 years and consider some of my best friends to come from there.
20. Some folks have asked how I became interested in politics and I am pretty sure it was Doonesbury.
21. When I was like 4 we went to some fair and I swore that I almost got flung off some rickety ride but this could be totally wrong. It was really frightening.
22. The coldest night of my life was spent in Los Nevados, Venezuela and the scariest car ride I ever took was leaving Los Nevados in a jeep and something that resembled a road.
23. A few sucker fish once tried to stick on me while I was doing a decompression stop after a dive. My dive buddy smacked the fish, which had devil faces, with the regulator, saving me from what would have been a really sort of sucky situation.
24. I am trying to learn how to surf and am really sorry that I did not do so when a teenager since I don t exactly have the time to really learn.
25. Since I am not sure how to end, I will do so with a

Once upon a time I ran a Valentine-Matching site for Livejournal users. (Actually I did it for about three years in a row, but then got bored.) The basic idea was simple, you'd visit a magical site and it would present you with the usernames of all your friends. You'd tick a few boxes, and that would nominate those users as your potential valentines. Then you'd do nothing until February 14th, at which point you'd discover if you matched. A match being made if you chose bob, and bob chose you in return. (Essentially the site is a big double-blind matching system, albeit with constrained membership, via lj.) The major technical difficulty in early days was preventing spoofed accounts. I didn't want Evil Alice to be able to visit the site and pretend to be Bob. In the couple of years I did this I came up with a couple of fun schemes to minimize the chances of this occuring - anything from using email validation, to requiring that users taking part updated their profiles to include a magic cookie-string, or posting to a specific community which I could later screen-scrape. These days the use of openid allows me to prevent spoofing in a trivial manner - and once I realised that I figured why the hell not?! In short here I am and here we go again:

• http://my.ljvalentine.com/

The motivation? Playing with openID and because I still like to "match people up". I am aware of one marriage that resulted from a match on my system back in 2003. There could be more. If you're a long-time reader you might remember ctrl-alt-date - how time flies - I just let the domain name(s) expire this week. The timing is a little bit of a coincidence, but not entirely. The only thing that I'm doing this time is not sending emails on matches, because I just can't. Unless I asked people to volunteer their mail addresses I don't have the data. Still I expect remembering to return for the results won't be a challenge. Now, lets get viral. But not in an icky fashion .. ObFilm: Daywatch

Only an outline so far but most of this code already exists in Emdebian SVN.

1. C/C++ application: langupdate using libapt-pkg and libglib2.0-0
   
   • Reads supported locales and silently installs only the supported translations for all installed packages, with fallback support where configured.
   
   
   • Silently removes all translations for all unsupported locales.
   
   
   • First run in langupdate postinst
   
   
   • Removes package translations on the next run after package removal.
   
   
   • Separate /etc/langupdate/tdeb.sources.list and /var/cache/langupdate/lists/ to keep apt cache size down. Manual changes will be overwritten so maybe it ought to live in /var/ or /usr/share/.
   
   
   • One source for each locale root, main_en, main_fr, main_pt etc. All sources maintained by langupdate directly, according to the list of supported locales.
   
   
   • Each source contains all translations for locales within scope: en_GB in en, pt_BR in pt etc. to support fallback correctly.


2. XS-Package-Type: tdeb with a file suffix of .deb (not .tdeb) to reduce the number of patches needed for a working implementation.


3. Server-side perl script: langmigrate that parses the .changes file:
   
   • Removes tdebs from existing repository.
   
   
   • Moves incoming tdebs into new layout.


4. No descriptions, no dependencies. All tdebs are Priority: extra and Architecture:all. Possible support for a tdeb1 version suffix for updates that are not yet in Debian. (Allows for translation updates without package uploads.)


5. Plan to remove (or support an alternative package) dependency on libglib2.0-0 but OK for Emdebian at the moment due to targetting of GPE.


6. langupdate itself Priority: optional and not part of the default emsandbox


7. langupdate is a native package, uploaded to and maintained in Emdebian. Migrate into Debian once infrastructure is ready.


8. langupdate has little or no output, only a help option and possibly support for --clean but everything else automated.

This is built on the emlocale method (from emdebian-tools) and emlocale will be modified to fit this plan in 0.5.4.
langupdate (and langmigrate) cannot be part of emdebian-tools themselves, so will be separate packages.
(and yes, it is 4am, I'm not sleeping well due to a viral infection.)

The site noonebelongsheremorethanyou.com is an advert for a book of short stories. The web site is funny and quirky (two qualities that are required for a site to become virally popular), works well on all browser sizes, has a navigation method that is unique (or at least something I don’t recall seeing done so well in 10 years of web surfing) and display all the needed information. I feel inclined to buy the book just to support the creation of amusing web sites! Update: Here is the Wikipedia page for Miranda July, thanks to meneame.net for the link.

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The site noonebelongsheremorethanyou.com is an advert for a book of short stories. The web site is funny and quirky (two qualities that are required for a site to become virally popular), works well on all browser sizes, has a navigation method that is unique (or at least something I don’t recall seeing done so well in 10 years of web surfing) and display all the needed information. I feel inclined to buy the book just to support the creation of amusing web sites!

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The scanning of the Debian source archive for security bugs has begun. I've wrote about this previously and there was some interest in how it worked, so I've put up a simple webpage describing the process. There are a lot of results to go through, but so far I've managed to find one local root exploit and many many many trivial problems. Sample bugs:

• came: buffer overflow in handling $HOME
• aatv: Buffer overflow in handling environmental variables.

Unfortunately my usertags seem to be broken. This was working a day or two ago. Not sure if I fucked up or if the BTS is broken ..?

As I've posted before, I recently read Lawrence Rosen's Open Source Licensing Software Freedom and Intellectual Property Law. And I'm sure many of you will recognize the enormous constructive value of early-morning cavilations. Well, today I woke up thinking about strengths and weaknesses in th different Free Software licenses, and I decided to add my grain to the world of license proliferation. So, here goes version 3.14 of the CoPL. I wonder how long will it take before it reaches /usr/share/common-licenses on Debian systems ;-)

		       CONFUSING PUBLIC LICENSE
		       ========================
	This is version 3.14 of the Confusing Public License (referred to from
now on as "CoPL"). Copyright (c) 2007 Transnational
Republic. Additional copies of this license can be purchased at no
cost from any Transnational Republic citizen at any of its recognized
outposts, or freely copied. 
	Any legal claims regarding Original works or any of their Standard
versions licensed under the CoPL Should not abide by and be carried
out according to the current law of the Transnational Republic. The
Original author to pay for any attorney and other legal fees of any
dispute regarding said Original author.
	This license text is designed to protect all the Technology covered
under it under a thick layer of incomprehension. No technical,
professional or social measures might be used to subvert the intent of
this license. This license Must be carefully or professionally
reviewed by a lawyer or attorney, under any jurisdiction. Any serious
attempt to understand this license will immediatly terminate your
rights to keep reading this license. Original works licensed under the CoPL
will not be affected by this provision, you will still have permission
to use them.
	Redistributions of source code Should not retain the above copyright notice,
this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 
	0. This License applies to any program or other work which contains a
   notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed
   under the terms of this Confusing Public License. The Original work
   below refers to any such program or work or Standard version.
	1. You desire to license the Technology to a
   large community to facilitate research, innovation and product
   development while maintaining compatibility of such products with
   the Technology as delivered by You
	2. Original author desires to license the Technology from You on
   the terms and conditions specified in this License.
	3. Redistributions in binary form Should not reproduce the above copyright
   notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
   documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
	4. The names "Joe", "Curly", "Moe" and "The Three Stooges Foundation"
   May be used to endorse or promote products derived from this
   Original work without prior written permission, as they are in no way
   related. 
	5. There is no number 5. Seriously. In all Original works licensed under the
   CoPL, all necessary technical and social steps May be taken not
   to include, in any explicit way, the number 5.
	6. Original author Must make and give away verbatim copies of the
   source form of this Package
   without restriction, provided that Original Author duplicates all of
   the original copyright notices and associated disclaimers.
	7. Original author Must apply bug fixes, portability fixes and other
   modifications derived from the Public Domain or from
   the Copyright Holder. A Package modified in such a
   way shall still be considered the Standard Version.
	8. No Standard versions of the Original work Must be protected by this
   license. Original authors Should not choose a different, saner
   licensing model for the distribution of any modifications they
   make. The CoPL should be taken as a retroviral license.
	THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS," WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND,
EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND
NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL YOU BE
LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION
OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION
WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
				     Definitions
	"You" means the original author of the work covered under the CoPL.
	"Original author" means you.
	"Thou" means God almighty.
	"May" means "Should not, no matter what".
	"Must" means "May".
	"Should not" means "Must".
	"Reasonable copying fee" means nothing.
	"Standard version" means a modified version of the Original work.
				      DISCLAIMER
	The CoPL text, from the words "This is version" and up to and
including this paragraph, is to be taken as a preamble, and will not
be effective under any circumstances. 
	All work licensed under the CoPL should be considered as licensed
under the GNU General Public License version 2 or (at your option) any
later version. It is not the task of this license to point you on
where to get hold of said license.

I was recently asked to help someone understand the OpenSource movement, and the effects it might have on companies such as Oracle or SAP. I talked a bit that these companies can benefit from being independant of big vendors like Microsoft, while still not having to do everything themselves. But also on how opensource alternatives to their products will threaten their business in the long run and force them to be more innovative and constantly improve their product. I then talked about the 'viral' aspects in OpenSource; not about that GPL licensing bullshit (just read the licenses of stuff you want to use, and don't use them if you don't like the license...; this virality is highly overrated due to Microsofts FUD), but a very different kind of virality: Let's say you are supposed to evaluate different CMS solutions. So you install one or another that sounds promising. Most likely you'll install an opensource database like MySQL or Postgresql. And when you've decided upon a solution, you are quite likely to go with this database, and say to yourself: "if MySQL doesn't scale up well enough for our needs, we can still but an Oracle license". This would be probably different if you had had installed Oracle in the first place. Say a demo or so. But the demo versions of the CMS you tried already made you comfortable in using MySQL; it's easy to install (most likely included with your system anyway), and it just works. But would you have tried a CMS in first place that actuall required you to setup Oracle? Anyway, this "social" virality brought me to another point: developers and administrators. When you see numbers on the market share of Microsoft, they're still huge. Some 95% of users are using Microsoft as their primary operation system (I'm discounting the fact that a huge share of DSL modems here is running Linux, so actually many people are Linux users, and I'm also discounting the use of www.google.com, which would make 99.9% of people Linux users...). But these are the average users. But they aren't on their own. The software choice of the "average user" is influenced by a couple of factors, including:

• if anything goes wrong, whom can I call for help?
• company (administrative, security) policies
• word of mouth and (software) recommendations

But if you look at the computer geeks around you, what are they using? A huge share of the people I know are using Linux. Not everyone is using Linux as their main desktop system, but many are. Others are using Linux just for their development stuff, some only on servers. It doesn't really matter, Linux is huge with the geeks. When I look at the sofware my mom has installed on her Windows system (which also dual-boots Linux, and interestingly is the primary choice for watching a movie - Windows doesn't playback sound with some videos...): half of it is opensource. There is OpenOffice.org, Gimp, Gaim, Firefox, Thunderbird, Inkscape, LyX, Mplayer and a couple others. He favourite game? PySol. My dad already has switched to Linux as his main operating system. So why did they switch to so much opensource software? Because it's what I recommended them, and where I can help them. My mom needed a software to record something for her blog (yes, she's "podcasting" now) - of course I recommended her an opensource application, audacity. My mom is giving private lessons in math and physics; she's very successful at that. When one of her students got herself a laptop, she of course was given all kinds of (opensource!) software. For her highschool thesis she needed a vector graphics program - she ended up with inkscape. Now if my parents have some problem with Windows, who are they going to ask? I didn't manage to solve the video playback issues, my mom by herself switched to Linux for watching movies. It didn't work with Windows, I couldn't help her - she switched to something where she knews she'd get more support (and where the problem by chance didn't occur). Now let's have a look at the university. Our computer pool for the students is all Linux. There are a few windows systems for legacy purposes, I never found out if they are accessible to regular students; I only know they're supposed to exist. When doing some assignment, you're very often required to use some opensource software. For a thesis, you'll very likely be building upon some opensource system. The mathematics institute is still on solaris, but recently Gnome was installed there. Physics and electrical engineering also have mostly Linux systems, I've heard. For software development, it's pretty much a "develop on Linux, run anywhere", whereas Windows-only developers usually need to port their applications (or trust on Wine being able to run them good enough on Linux). So more and more people start developing on Linux, and get to love it's great development environment (after all, Linux was pretty much completely done by software developers...). And that is how Microsoft might already have lost the desktop war: developers, technical students and administrators (who usually also love their Linux boxes). They're only a small share of the userbase, but they're influential. In fact, other users rely on them being able to eventually fix their systems for them. But since these are using Windows much less already, they will be less capable of assisting others with Windows. They'll be putting Linux systems everywhere, and keep on encouraging them to make the switch. Of course it will still take some years, but you can expect more and more companies (and cities) to switch over, like the city of Munich. Windows support staff on the other hand might even become more expensive. I don't know of any numbers on the MCSE programme (Minesweeper Consultant, Solitaire Expert) - does anyone have numbers on "graduates" for that?