Open Source Initiative

Open Source Initiative
standard OSI logo
Formation	February 1998
President	Simon Phipps
Website	opensource.org

The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is an organization dedicated to promoting open-source software.

The organization was founded in February 1998, by Bruce Perens and Eric S. Raymond, prompted by Netscape Communications Corporation publishing the source code for its flagship Netscape Communicator product. Later, in August 1998 the organization added a board of directors.

Raymond was president from its founding until February 2005. In May 2012 the new board elected Simon Phipps as president.^[1]

Relationship with the free software movement

Although born from the same history of Unix, Internet free software, and the hacker culture as the free software movement launched by Richard Stallman and his Free Software Foundation, the Open Source Initiative was formed and chose the term open source, in Michael Tiemann's words, to "dump the moralizing and confrontational attitude that had been associated with 'free software' in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that had motivated Netscape."^[2]

Stallman counter-charges that OSI's pragmatic focus on a model for software development and marketing ignores what he considers to be the central "ethical imperative" and the focus on "freedom" that underlies free software, as he defines it, and blurs the distinction with semi-free or wholly proprietary software.^[3] To Stallman, the important, fundamental difference is philosophical. Nevertheless, he describes his free software movement and the Open Source Initiative as separate camps within the same free-software community. According to Stallman, "We disagree with the open source camp on the basic goals and values, but their views and ours lead in many cases to the same practical behavior—such as developing free software. As a result, people from the free software movement and the open source camp often work together on practical projects such as software development."^[3]

History

As a campaign of sorts, "open source" was launched in 1998 by Jon "maddog" Hall, Larry Augustin, Eric S. Raymond, Bruce Perens, and others.^[4][5]

The group adopted the Open Source Definition for open-source software, based on the Debian Free Software Guidelines. They also established the Open Source Initiative (OSI) as a steward organization for the movement. However, they were unsuccessful in their attempt to secure a trademark for 'open source' to control the use of the term.^[6] In 2008, in an apparent effort to reform governance of the organization, the OSI Board invited 50 individuals to join a "Charter Members" group; by 26 July 2008, 42 of the original invitees had accepted the invitations. The full membership of the Charter Members has never been publicly revealed, and the Charter Members group communicated by way of a closed-subscription mailing list, "osi-discuss", with non-public archives.^[7] Public information indicates that the group included Bradley M. Kuhn, Karl Fogel, Jim Blandy, Chamindra da Silva, Lawrence Rosen, and David Ascher.^[8][9][10] Then-OSI Board member Danese Cooper was the principal moderator of osi-discuss.^[11] Kuhn later recollected that the Charter Membership was a "brouhaha (bordering on a flame fest)" and took no action.^[12]

In 2009, the OSI was temporarily suspended from operation as a California corporation, apparently in response to a complaint concerning tax paperwork from earlier years.^[13] Its current status is "Active".^[14]

In 2012, under the leadership of OSI director Simon Phipps, the OSI began transitioning towards a membership-based governance structure. The OSI initiated an Affiliate Membership program for "government-recognized non-profit charitable and not-for-profit industry associations and academic institutions anywhere in the world".^[15] Subsequently, the OSI announced an Individual Membership program.^[16]

On November 8, 2013, OSI appointed Patrick Masson as its General Manager.^[17]

Board members

The current Open Source Initiative board is:^[18][19]

Past board members include:

Open-source-related movements

• IGOS
• MyOSS – Malaysia
• Ma3bar – Arab Region

See also

• Free Software Foundation
• Digital freedom
• Open Source Definition
• Comparison of open source and closed source
• Business models for open-source software - economic model used in context with open source software
• Commons-based peer production – economic model for organizing projects without leaders or financial compensation
• Open-source governance – use of open-source principles to transform human social governance
• Techno-progressivism – a stance of active support for the convergence of technological change and social progress
• Open-source movement- The evolution and evidence of the open-source ideology

References

External links

• Official Website
• List of OSI approved licenses