governance

The place of the open source ecosystem in the innovation landscape
When open source solutions began to compete successfully against established commercial products in the early 1990s, the pervasive and …
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Economics of Open Source
This chapter showcases the relationship between free and open source software (FOSS) and economics. FOSS is unique in that it is at the …
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Open Source Software in Standard Setting: The Role of Intellectual Property Right Regimes
This chapter considers the intersection of open source software and FRAND (‘Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory’) licensing and its …
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Standard setting organizations and open source communities: Partners or competitors?
Standardization serves a as a means to improve overall quality of life through the economies of scale gained from the pervasive …
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Opinions and facts
From The Economist Espresso: Quote of the day For a long time I was looking for a source for this quote. Separating facts and opinions provides a good foundation for many debates.
Last updated on Sep 22, 2019 1 min read
Claim the right not to tolerate the intolerant
From The Economist Espresso: Quote of the day Karl Popper is one of my heroes. His thoughts on the “open society” are one of the most influential books I read while studying at university (and again, recently).
Last updated on Sep 22, 2019 1 min read
'Open Source in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft' an der Sommeruni 2013 des evangelischen Studienwerks
Jedes Jahr wieder findet die Sommeruni des evangelischen Studienwerks statt. In diesem Jahr mit dabei war das Seminar Open Source in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft von Mirko Boehm. Paul Adams unterstützte als Ko-Referent.
Last updated on Sep 22, 2019 2 min read
KDE e.V. General Assembly 2013

tl;dr: If you are a committed KDE contributor and not a KDE e.V. member, you are doing it wrong. If you are a KDE user, consider helping the KDE User Working Group. Read KDE e.V.’s quarterly reports.

Voting at the KDE e.V. general assembly
The test vote before the assembly officially started

Akademy 2013 is still on its way, and as usual the KDE e.V. General Assembly was held as a part of it. KDE e.V. is the representation and governance body of the KDE community. Membership in this not-for-profit association registered in Berlin, Germany is open to all KDE contributors . Members usually assemble once a year to coordinate, to vote on issues important to the community and to elect representatives and board members as needed. The highlights this year where the discussion of the role of the Community Working Group, the report on the first activities of the newly established Financial Working Group, and the election of one new board member. I was the chairperson of the assembly, and this is my inofficial report.

Last updated on Sep 22, 2019 6 min read
Is Open Source democratic?
In his recent post, Glyn Moody asks an important question - “Can Open Source be democratic?” He describes how Free Software emerged as a distributed, bottom-up system of writing code. The central defining aspects of that culture are a uniquely open process not just of programming but also of its organization, and a close relationship between programmers and users.
Last updated on May 16, 2019 8 min read
It's the Free Software, stupid!
Heated discussions are going on in the KDE community in the aftermath of the announcement of Nokia’s platform strategy change. Rationality often goes out of the window when people feel such a change goes against their personal values or beliefs.
Last updated on Aug 24, 2019 15 min read