Monday, May 24, 2004
Open
Discuss
I saw this article on Slashdot about an open source interface to Project Gutenberg.
If you haven’t heard of it before, you should check out Project Gutenberg. The concept is pretty simple: Put public domain books online. This project is, I’m sure, done ‘for the greater good’ and the contributors have little incentive for profit. But how much more successful would their project be if they could find a way to profit from their work?
Open source has been a trend for a long time, and I think that it is one that is going to continue for a long time. If open source contributors can get creative and find a way to generate some cash from their projects without compromising their free content, the movement could explode.
There are a number of types of ‘open’ that are currently being pursued:
1. Software -> sourceforge.net
2. Information -> Project Gutenberg, Wikipedia
3. Learning -> MIT’s OpenCourseware
Let's get creative and come up with some ideas on how these services could make some money to further their cause without compromising the free ‘thing’ that they want to be free.
I saw this article on Slashdot about an open source interface to Project Gutenberg.
If you haven’t heard of it before, you should check out Project Gutenberg. The concept is pretty simple: Put public domain books online. This project is, I’m sure, done ‘for the greater good’ and the contributors have little incentive for profit. But how much more successful would their project be if they could find a way to profit from their work?
Open source has been a trend for a long time, and I think that it is one that is going to continue for a long time. If open source contributors can get creative and find a way to generate some cash from their projects without compromising their free content, the movement could explode.
There are a number of types of ‘open’ that are currently being pursued:
1. Software -> sourceforge.net
2. Information -> Project Gutenberg, Wikipedia
3. Learning -> MIT’s OpenCourseware
Let's get creative and come up with some ideas on how these services could make some money to further their cause without compromising the free ‘thing’ that they want to be free.
