The term ‘open source’ refers to much more than just being able to use free software. In a nutshell, Open Source Software (OSS) is crowdsourcing applied to software development. The term originated when early software developers collaborated to learn from and with each other to create computer programs. OSS makes the coding publicly accessible for anyone to modify and improve on it, on condition that they continue to leave it available to share for free. Today, the term “open source” designates a wider set of values — referred to as “the open source way.”
Open source projects, platforms, products or initiatives are therefore based on principles of co-creation, collaboration and transparency, enabling rapid prototyping, meritocracy (as in users flow to the best ones, unconcerned about non-existent costs), and community-oriented development. In this article we take a look at ten business sectors where open source platforms are having a significant impact.
This article was first published by Crowdsourcing Week and you can read it in full at https://crowdsourcingweek.com/blog/10-business-sectors-where-top-open-source-platforms-have-an-impact/
