On the podcast today we have Morten Rand-Hendriksen.

Morten has a long history of working with WordPress, but that’s not the main focus of the podcast today. Today we talk about the way that open source as a whole is governed and managed, and his thoughts on the changes he thinks are needed.

When open source software came into the world, the landscape was very different. Back then, there was no real clarity about whether the proprietary or open source software model would dominate. There was no indication that the internet would become such a crucial part of how we communicate, interact and shop.

People gave their time because they enjoyed what they were doing and had high hopes about the world that they could build with their software.

Fast forward to today and many open source projects are critical to the functioning of the internet. A small collection of people, sometimes an individual, might be in charge of a component which, were it to fail, would bring the web to a halt.

Recent episodes have shown us that given this reliance on the contributions of open source community members, it’s important that we can turn to them for patches and updates when they’re needed. But that might not be the case. The contributors might be busy with other projects, or otherwise unable to fix problems that arise.

Morten thinks that there’s a need to revisit the governance model for open source given that we now live in a world where important parts of the internet rely on the work of such volunteers. He wants there to be systems by which contributors are remunerated for their contributions.

He also wants to shine a light on who is able to contribute to open source projects, and so we discuss his thoughts on who in reality has the time, interest and resources to contribute. His opinion is that open source might not be as open to everyone as it would seem.

It’s a fascinating conversation and will no doubt stir up some discussion.

Useful links.

Open Source Considered Harmful

A Fatal Flaw in the Bazaar’s Foundations