Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software [Paperback]

Joseph Feller (Editor), Brian Fitzgerald (Editor), Scott A. Hissam (Editor), Karim R. Lakhani (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 26, 2007

What is the status of the Free and Open Source Software (F/OSS) revolution? Has the creation of software that can be freely used, modified, and redistributed transformed industry and society, as some predicted, or is this transformation still a work in progress? Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software brings together leading analysts and researchers to address this question, examining specific aspects of F/OSS in a way that is both scientifically rigorous and highly relevant to real-life managerial and technical concerns.The book analyzes a number of key topics: the motivation behind F/OSS -- why highly skilled software developers devote large amounts of time to the creation of "free" products and services; the objective, empirically grounded evaluation of software -- necessary to counter what one chapter author calls the "steamroller" of F/OSS hype; the software engineering processes and tools used in specific projects, including Apache, GNOME, and Mozilla; the economic and business models that reflect the changing relationships between users and firms, technical communities and firms, and between competitors; and legal, cultural, and social issues, including one contribution that suggests parallels between "open code" and "open society" and another that points to the need for understanding the movement's social causes and consequences.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"An excellent international and interdisciplinary repository of the latest research and thinking on free and open software movements and practices. With this intellectual miracle, the editors and contributors pave the way to a new open science paradigm."--Claudio Ciborra, London School of Economics and IULM, Milan, author of *The Labyrinths of Information*

" Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software is the most comprehensive collection of writings on open source software that I have seen. The authors tackle the difficult questions that surround its success, from what motivates developers to write software for free to how companies can incorporate the best of the open source model into their environments." Martin Fink , Vice President, Linux, Hewlett-Packard

"This is a carefully written, well-argued book that synthesizes a lot of good original research on the user-centered model of innovation. It makes a significant contribution to our general understanding of the innovation process in an area where our knowledge is especially thin. A thought-provoking and extremely valuable book."--Carliss Y. Baldwin, William L. White Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School, coauthor of *Design Rules: The Power of Modularity*

"*Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software* is the most comprehensive collection of writings on open source software that I have seen. The authors tackle the difficult questions that surround its success, from what motivates developers to write software for free to how companies can incorporate the best of the open source model into their environments."--Martin Fink, Vice President, Linux, Hewlett-Packard

About the Author

Brian Fitzgerald holds the Frederick A. Krehbiel II Chair in Innovation in Global Business and Technology, Department of Computer Science and Information Systems, University of Limerick, Ireland.

Karim R. Lakhani is a doctoral candidate in management at the MIT Sloan School of Management, strategy consultant with The Boston Consulting Group, and cofounder of the MIT Open Source Research Project.

Joseph Feller is Lecturer in Business Information Systems, University College Cork, Ireland.

Scott A. Hissam is Senior Member of the Technical Staff, Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University.

Product Details

• Paperback: 570 pages
• Publisher: The MIT Press (January 26, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0262562278
• ISBN-13: 978-0262562270
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,346,756 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars dials down the hype, August 3, 2005

By 

W Boudville (Terra, Sol 3) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software (Hardcover)

The free software or open source movement has, not surprisingly, garnered lots of free publicity. Encouraged by massive hyperventilating by its proponents. In contrast, this book steps back and offers a more dispassionate and nuanced analysis of the zeitgeist, for surely the movement deserves that label.

You get background as to the social motivations and the history of the movement. Which is shown to predate the Web and linux. GNU in the 1980s was all about alternatives to proprietary operating systems and compilers.

The book can help you dial down the hype. Yet, ultimately, it offers a broadly positive affirmation of the movement. There is shown to be no impediment or logical flaw to cause open source to not stop growing. Rather, the book suggests that both proprietary and open source software will always be with us, albeit in a sometimes uneasy coexistence.