Open Source Software: Collective Intelligence

Open Source software is an important part of DIY Communities, a system of rapid evolution, it entails that new versions are often updated, software development is direct and quick responses to user needs, with user involvement. Traditional commercial production is vastly different, with the source of the information coming from few to many, with updates and changes happening very slowly.

Open source software operates on several key assumptions. These assumptions include that everyone had a contribution to make. As Jenkins (2006) states, everybody knows something. Open source software operates on the assumption that everybody has something to share and has something valuable to contribute.

Another assumption is that community involvement is more likely if community experimentation is encouraged. Experimentation brings innovation, and any experimentation is to be encouraged and allowed to proliferate.

The benefit for the user to contribute while not only satisfying their own want of expression of ideas, is also to gain social standing within the open source software community. Other reasons may also motivate the user to participate in Open Source software, whatever the reason, an underlying assumption is that users will contribute if it does not inconvenience themselves and is beneficial both for themselves and others.

Furthermore, it is critical for the ownership of the project to be shared. It will be unlikely that contributors will continue to contribute if the content that is produced ultimately benefits a commercial software publisher.

To summarise, through contributing and continual improvements within these structures, collective intelligence may be increased as a whole. Through collaboration, resources are pooled and skills may be combined to benefit society on the whole.

References:

Muir, A. 2008. Open Source Software and beyond. Virtual Cultures [Lecture].

Jenkins, H. 2006. Introduction: Worship at the Altar of Convergence. In Jenkins, H. Convergence Culture: When new and old media collide. New York: New York University.