open source and free culture

fdm 20c introduction to digital media

lecture 16.10.2008

warren sack / film & digital media department / university of california, santa cruz

last time: conceptual art / software

art

outline for today

definition: what is open source software?

examples of open source software
history of free software and open source
open source business models
open source software development model
open source art?
what, other than software, might be open source?

free culture: open source licensing models & beyond

copyleft and other legal means
lessigs creative commons project

where will possible midterm questions be posted?

what is open source software?

Open Source software is distributed with its
source code. The Open Source Definition has
three essential features:
It allows free re-distribution of the software without
royalties or licensing fees to the author
It requires that source code be distributed with the
software or otherwise made available for no more
than the cost of distribution
It allows anyone to modify the software or derive
other software from it, and to redistribute the modified
software under the same terms.
Steven Weber, The Political Economy of Open Source
Software, BRIE Working Paper 140,
http://brie.berkeley.edu/~briewww/pubs/pubs/wp/wp140.pdf

what is free/libre/open source

software?
Users are allowed to run the software for any
purpose.
Users are able to closely examine and study the
software and are able to freely modify and
improve it to fill their needs better.
Users are able to give copies of the software to
other people to whom the software will be useful
Users are able to improve the software and
freely distribute their improvements to the
broader public so that they, as a whole, benefit.
FLOSS Is Not Just Good for Your Teeth

Other definitions of OSS

http://www.opensource.org/docs/osd
http://www.fsf.org
Florian Cramer essay assigned in todays
readings
Note also that Eben Moglen of Columbia
University and the Free Software Foundation
(original author of the copyleft General Public
License) is speaking today on campus: 3:00pm
at the University Center in the Alumni Room.

examples of open source software

Operating Systems
Linux
FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD: The BSDs are all
based on the Berkeley Systems Distribution of Unix,
developed at the University of California, Berkeley.
Another BSD based open source project is Darwin,
which is the foundation of Apple's Mac OS X.

examples of open source software

Internet
Apache, which runs over 50% of the world's web
servers.
BIND, the software that provides the DNS (domain
name service) for the entire Internet.
sendmail, the most important and widely used email
transport software on the Internet.
Mozilla, the open source redesign of the Netscape
Browser
OpenSSL is the standard for secure communication
(strong encryption) over the Internet.categories.

example of open source software

Programming Tools
Zope, and PHP, are popular engines behind the "live
content" on the World Wide Web.
Languages:

Perl
Python
Ruby
Tcl/Tk

GNU compilers and tools

GCC
Make
Autoconf
Automake
etc.

open source software sites

Free Software Foundation www.fsf.org

Open Source Initiative www.opensource.org
Freshmeat.net
SourceForge.net
OSDir.com
developer.BerliOS.de
Bioinformatics.org
see also individual project sites; e.g.,
www.apache.org; www.cpan.org; etc.

some dates from the history of open source

1970s: UNIX operating system developed at
Bell Labs and by a diverse group of contributors
outside of Bell Labs; later AT&T enforces
intellectual property rights and closes the code
1983: Richard Stallman founds the Free
Software Foundation
1993: Linus Torvalds releases first version of
Linux built
1997: Debian Free Software Guidelines
released
1998: Netscape releases Navigator in source

conventional models
of software development
waterfall
from requirements to code without a backward turn
historically used for large military and corporate software
productions; originally used because computing time was
expensive

spiral
iterative cycles of requirements, development,
testing, redrafting of requirements, etc.
B. W. Boehm. A spiral model of software development and
enhancement. IEEE Computer, 21(5):61--72, 1988

open source software development

bazaar
Treating your users as co-developers is your leasthassle route to rapid code improvement and effective
debugging.
Linuss Law: Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are
shallow.
Eric Steven Raymond, The Cathedral and the
Bazaar, http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedralbazaar/cathedral-bazaar/

open source software development

Use
Users Documenters
Bug reporters
Patchers
Maintainers
Core
developer(s)

Users

Use

open source business models

service
support
education
extensions

open source companies

IBM
uses and develops Apache and Linux; created Secure Mailer
and created other software on AlphaWorks

Apple
released core layers of Mac OS X Server as an open source
BSD operating system called Darwin; open sourced the
QuickTime Streaming Server, the OpenPlay network gaming
toolkit, etc.

HP
uses and releases products running Linux

Sun
uses Linux; supports some open source development
efforts(Forte IDE for Java and the Mozilla web browser)

open source companies

Red Hat Software
Linux vendor

ActiveState
develops and sells professional tools for Perl, Python,
and Tcl/tk developers.

open source licensing

see http://www.opensource.org/licenses/

apache software license

python license
ibm public license
apple public source license
etc.

GNU General Public License

see http://www.opensource.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html

creative commons
non-software licenses: see larry lessigs creative
commons project
(http://www.creativecommons.org/learn/licenses)

creative commons licenses explained

Attribution. You let others copy, distribute,
display, and perform your copyrighted work
and derivative works based upon it but only if
they give you credit.
Example: Jane publishes her photograph with an
Attribution license, because she wants the world to
use her pictures provided they give her credit. Bob
finds her photograph online and wants to display it on
the front page of his website. Bob puts Jane's picture
on his site, and clearly indicates Jane's authorship.
www.creativecommons.org/learn/licenses

creative commons licenses explained

Noncommercial. You let others copy, distribute,
display, and perform your work and derivative
works based upon it but for noncommercial
purposes only.
Examples: Gus publishes his photograph with a
Noncommercial license. Camille incorporates a piece
of Gus's image into a collage poster. Camille is not
allowed to sell her collage poster without Gus's
permission.
www.creativecommons.org/learn/licenses

creative commons licenses explained

No Derivative Works. You let others copy,
distribute, display, and perform only verbatim
copies of your work, not derivative works based
upon it.
Example: Sara licenses a recording of her song with
a No Derivative Works license. Joe would like to cut
Sara's track and mix it with his own to produce an
entirely new song. Joe cannot do this without Jane's
permission (unless his song amounts to fair use).
www.creativecommons.org/learn/licenses

creative commons licenses explained

Share Alike. You allow others to distribute
derivative works only under a license identical to
the license that governs your work.
www.creativecommons.org/learn/licenses

open source as art

2004 golden nica award from ars electronica to the
creative commons project
1999 golden nica award from ars electronica to the linux
operating system
See the Takeovers & Makeovers conference,
November 7 & 8, 2008 @ UC Berkeley
http://bcnm.berkeley.edu/takeovers/

art as open source

open_source_art_hack, 2002
steve dietz and jenny marketou
http://www.netartcommons.net/

florian cramer essay

is software a form of politics?

The code of cyberspace -- whether the Internet, or net within

the Internet -- the code of cyberspace defines that space. It
constitutes that space. And as with any constitution, it builds
within itself a set of values, and possibilities, that governs life
there ... I've been selling the idea that we should assure that
our values get architected into this code. That if this code
reflects values, then we should identify the values that come from
our tradition -- privacy, free speech, anonymity, access -- and insist
that this code embrace them if it is to embrace values at all. Or
more specifically still: I've been arguing that we should look to the
structure of our constitutional tradition, and extract from it the
values that are constituted by it, and carry these values into the
world of the Internet's governance -- whether the governance is
through code, or the governance is through people.

Open Code and Open Societies: Values of Internet Governance,

Larry Lessig (1999)

open source in general

what, other than software, might be open
source?

larry lessig on free culture

larry lessigs book entitled free culture
you can download it for free from here:
http://www.free-culture.cc/freecontent/

you can listen to him explain it here:

http://www.npr.org/features/feature.php?wfId=1785931

next time: networks and protocols