Serkan Holat’s Post

"The whole aim behind open software is to make public administration more transparent and interactive because I really think it’s important that we lower this perceived barrier between the people and the state." 💯

The Economics of Programming Languages by Evan Czaplicki 💯 "In the mythology of open source, programming languages are created by people who seemingly have no direct economic function. They are just really good at compilers (somehow) and have a house to live in (somehow) and have a lifetime to devote to creating a useful programming language (somehow!) We will examine specific organizations that create programming languages. Where do the salaries for compiler engineers come from? How does Go end up with 5 engineers and Dart end up with 30? Who signs off on these expenses and why? Does this put any boundaries on language design or development practices? And how do the economics work for people outside of the major tech corporations? My goal is to give the talk I needed to hear 10 years ago when I was just starting on Elm. By clearly delineating the many variations of corporate funding and independent funding, I hope users will come away with a better foundation for evaluating and comparing programming languages. Evan Czaplicki - Creator of Elm" #OpenSource https://lnkd.in/dkGVTbFT

The US Government, Open Source Software and Analyzing 786 Pages of Responses - Part II: Highlights 🔍 As promised, here is the second part of the series, sharing notable sections from the responses to the US Government's Request for Information on Open Source Software. In the article, you will find a compilation of over 40 highlights, mainly in a single paragraph form and gathered under the following topics: - Current State - Facts and Figures - Most Important Area - Public Funding - Ideas and Insights - Let's Be Frank - Rules and Regulations Enjoy reading the collection, and let me know what you think ✌ https://lnkd.in/dWUhqwRV #OpenSource #TechPolicy

The US Government, Open Source Software and Analyzing 786 Pages of Responses - Part I: Results 🔍 The US government's recent Request for Information on Open Source Software has turned into a gold mine, collecting 786 pages of feedback from 107 organizations and individuals, including big tech companies, foundations, and think tanks, while providing a valuable overview of how OSS is defined, the current state of the ecosystem, the potential solutions, and more. My initial interest in reviewing responses from known organizations quickly shifted into a semi-professional and purely manual content analysis. Curious about the outcome and my initial reactions? You can check my first article below 👇 In the upcoming article, I will share over forty highlights from the following organizations under several topics. - Amazon Web Services - Anchore, Inc - Apache Software Foundation - Atlantic Council - Cyber Statecraft Initiative - Carnegie Mellon University - Software Engineering Institute - Chainguard - Cybersecurity Coalition Comments - Datalytica - Eclipse Foundation - GitHub - Google - Institute for Security and Technology (IST) - Microsoft Corporation - MITRE's Center for Data-Driven Policy - Open Source Initiative (OSI) - Open@RIT - Rochester Institute of Technology - OpenSSF - OWASP Foundation, Inc. - Python Software Foundation - Red Hat, Inc. - RTX Technology Research Center - Rust Foundation - Sonatype, Inc. - The Open Source Technology Improvement Fund - Tidelift, Inc. As usual, your feedback is priceless! Don't hesitate to share your comments, questions, or ideas 🙏 https://lnkd.in/dYRxVdxj #OpenSource #TechPolicy

Dear #opensource people, I'm working on a purely manual content/sentiment analysis on the submitted responses to the US Government's Open Source Software Security RFI. I started looking at the responses to identify the closest ones to mine, but it's expanding slightly. My questions are more or less the following ~ while let's keep in mind that RFI focuses on "security": - How do we define OSS? Volunteer work (or a shift more to paid maintainers), digital infrastructure, public good? - What is the general sentiment around open source software, the current state, and solutions? - Since governments are getting involved, do we address issues related to bureaucratic processes? - Do we recognize its impact on the economy or social issues, e.g., any mention of Sustainable Development Goals? Here are the main keywords I searched: Volunteer, Digital infrastructure, Sovereign Tech Fund, Cyber Resilience Act, Public good, Tax incentives, Free rider, Bureaucracy. I plan to expand the list with OSPO, Procurement, and [Public/government] funding (although it's a little tricky to capture). So far, 100 responses were submitted, totaling 726 pages. At least ten more responses should be on the way. I manually reviewed 34 responses and plan to check 10~15 more (the green ones). -Are there any other keywords you would include in the list? -Is there a response I shouldn't miss? There may be ones from well-known organizations within the US. - Do you have any suggestions on approaching and visualizing the results? Let me know what you think! #opensourcesoftware #policy

I shared my humble National Public Fund to Finance Open Source Ecosystem response to the US Government's Request for Information on Open-Source Software Security: https://lnkd.in/dP5uidyY Briefly, considering OSS falls under the public good category and its global consumption leads to the well-known Free-rider problem: - Can we establish dedicated funds to overcome coordination issues? - And can we design these funds tailored to the fast-paced nature of these new digital public goods? Here is the Principles section for the Scalable Public Funds: - Proactive: The fund should proactively identify and evaluate eligible open source initiatives, reducing bureaucracy and uncertainty. - Scalable: The fund should be designed to scale, accounting for the continued growth of the open source ecosystem. - Data-Driven: Resource allocation should rely on objective metrics, ensuring unbiased distribution. - Transparent: The evaluation criteria, metrics, and weights should be publicly accessible. - Continuous: Acknowledging the ongoing contributions of the OSS to the economy, the fund should commit to generating constant revenue rather than one-off payments. #DigitalGoodsIncome: I use this term for the first time to explain the income to be received from the funds. Another similar one was the "Universal Income for Open Source Maintainers" proposal title I used under the Future of Europe platform, which received good reactions back then. At the last minute, I also added YouTube as a scalable funding structure. Feel free to share what you think! Notable references: - Ecosyste.ms - European Public Digital Infrastructure Fund White Paper by Open Future Foundation - Sovereign Tech Fund - Open Source Software and Global Entrepreneurship by Nataliya Langburd Wright, Frank Nagle, Shane Greenstein - Open Source Impact Study by OpenForum Europe & Fraunhofer ISI I am deeply grateful to those who took the time to review the text, ask questions, and share their feedback. Thank you 3000! 🙏 Deborah Bryant, Michelle Barker, Benjamin Nickolls, Richard Littauer, Gerardo Lisboa, Django Skorupa, Andrew Nesbitt What are the potential next steps? Large-scale simulations: Experiment with the algorithm and apply it to the entire Ecosystems dataset using different scenarios. Small-scale fund distribution: Another exercise can be distributing a fund based on the algorithm results, giving us an actual playground: - Limited number of OSS projects, e.g., 5 to 10 - Specific budget, e.g., ~€1000/month - Fixed timeline, e.g., six months to a year I'll continue to move on with these funding experiments in any case. Still, finding sponsors would significantly improve the progress. Do you know an organization or institution that might be interested in these ideas and experiments? Feel free to pass the word! #OpenSource #AgilePublicFunds

National Science Foundation (NSF) invests over $26 million in #OpenSource projects "The U.S. National Science Foundation announced an investment of over $26 million in 19 Phase II projects through the Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems (POSE) program, further cultivating the creation of new open-source ecosystems (OSEs) anticipated to lead to cutting-edge innovation."

Monopoly Power Is the Elephant in the Room in the AI Debate by Max von Thun-Hohenstein Yoshioka 💯 "... where a few corporations have gained so much power that they are able to extract value from and impose terms on everyone in their orbit, while having a disproportionate say over the information we consume and the ways in which we communicate." "Through their control of AI, Big Tech firms are likely to steer the technology in a direction that serves their narrow economic interests rather than the public interest, ..." "Trying to shape and limit AI’s use without addressing the monopoly power behind it is at best likely to be ineffective, and at worst will entrench the power of incumbents by regulating smaller players out of existence." "... the bigger opportunity lies in efforts to foster a more diverse ecosystem, including providing public funding to innovative startups, researchers and universities, and channelling public procurement towards alternatives to the tech giants." https://lnkd.in/duZFCZuf