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Hangout for experimental confirmation and demonstration of software, computing, and networking. The exercises don't always work out. The professor is a bumbler and the laboratory assistant is a skanky dufus.
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2005-04-12Building Blue Relationships and PartnershipsACM News Service:Sharing the Wealth at IBM. This is "Big Blue," not the other kind, though the red and blue could take a few tips here. I am drawn to this account not so much because of what IBM is doing in creating free licenses on patents that apply in open-source and open-standards work, but because of the stated purpose: "IBM wants to accelerate productivity and profitability via closer collaboration with suppliers, corporate customers, and industry partners through the sharing of patents and other intellectual property." What fascinates me is that IBM appears to recognize its industry and the industry community around open-source development as an aspect of partnership that works in its self-interest and that of its more-direct customers. This raises interesting considerations around the establishment of dependable systems with demonstrable trustworthiness, something that I ponder as part of my TROSTing investigations. Where I am baffled is in how one can move from conversations and arrangements that arise in the management of commitments in a performer/customer/contractual sense to what might correspond to equally powerful arrangements, if any, for trustworthiness in indirect elationships based on community participation and contribution. Questioning where commitment and accountability arises in community effort comes up immediately whenever a business relies on an open-source package for a strategic purpose. Something similar happens with commodity software. There a strong support relationship between the provider and the individual customer is not very strong. I have zero clout in obtaining a patch to Microsoft Office for some glitch, but General Motors can get that done because of master licensing and other arrangements made in the mutual interest of both Microsoft and GM. The differentiation of support through licensing schemes is a feature that provides a clear support arrangement between the two entities while also subdividing the market. I have no clue how that gap is to be covered with regard to trustworthiness, especially around any expectation of support, in the absence of a direct relationship, though I need to take a stab at it. The impact of IBM's approach is probably not to be felt before I complete my dissertation on TROST, but I will keep watching this unfolding experiment. Looking back over these words, it does look like the creation of support businesses, already undertaken with packagings of Linux, might be the answer after all. I wonder if it is really that simple. Steve Lohr's 2005-04-11 New York Times article will be available on-line for a few more days [;<).&nbps; The John Kelly quote makes more sense there:"The layer of technology that is open is going to steadily increase, but in going through this transition we're not going to be crazy," Mr. Kelly said. "This is like disarmament. You're not going to give away all your missiles as a first step."Another lead, beside my readings on trust economies, may lie here: "If you open up your technology and reveal quickly, people will build on your stuff," said Eric von Hippel, a professor at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and author of a new book, "Democratizing Innovation" (MIT Press, 2005). "It becomes more economically efficient to be open."There is more in the piece. What works for me is the idea that "interoperability trumps intellectual property" in producing open systems that grow markets and opportunities for all of the participants. I favor that. Now let's see how this plays out in reality.
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