For many, open source is believed to be the future. If you aren’t familiar, in basic terms, open source is software that is accompanied by free to distribute source code. By having the source code, users can see the guts of the program they are using. This is in contrast to closed source software, like most of Microsoft’s, where the code is hidden to retain intellectual property and make a profit.
Neither school of thought is wrong — you can’t fault a company for trying to make money by going closed source. Bill Gates would not have become the richest man in the world if Microsoft’s software portfolio was open. However, not everyone lives for money. Open source allows even the poorest people to potentially access quality software at no charge. Today, Google announces it is looking for college students to work on open source projects for its 10th year of Summer of Code.
Web Webster has more than 20 years of writing and editorial experience in the tech sector. He’s written and edited news, demand generation, user-focused, and thought leadership content for business software solutions, consumer tech, and Linux Today, he edits and writes for a portfolio of tech industry news and analysis websites including webopedia.com, and DatabaseJournal.com.
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