Licensing and Business Models

License affects software companies’ business activities. While proprietary software vendors create custom licenses, open source companies have less flexibility. The Open Source Initiative (OSI) defines a list of 72 licenses as open source (“OSI approved”). For a project to follow open source licensing, it has to pick licenses from this set. Logically, we expect that an open source company defines its business model around the license that it selects. Thus, we can assume that business model decisions follow license choice. In our research we find that in some cases open source companies remove these license constraints for business reasons. We observed cases of open source companies moving from one OSI-approved license to another or companies innovating by adding additional terms. In all these cases, the decision of change is based on the license being a poor fit with their business goals. Not all open source companies are entitled to change the license because this option is available only to companies that own intellectual property. If they do not, they can try to reshape their business model, but that remains a suboptimal option. Whether cognizant of it or not, organizations are implicitly choosing a business model when they select a license. Therefore, it is very important to address licensing and business model decisions as one system instead of a disjointed two-step process. For this purpose we introduce (1) an evolutionary model where license selection and business model impact each other and (2) a taxonomy that addresses both licensing and business models. Our approach helps practitioners include revenue considerations in the licensing choice and researchers to more accurately study the antecedents and consequences of license choice.

A Developers Bill of Rights: What Open Source Developers Want in a Software License

In this paper, we study open source developers' perspectives on the nature and structure of software licenses as well as the processes through which these licenses are designed. Recent history has shown that software licensing approaches are critical to the dynamics of the software industry and the open source ecosystem, and thus of interest to the many policy makers and practitioners that follow this part of the global economy. The study is timely, since it informs the debate on the revision of the GPL license, one of the most popular licenses in use. This revision has the potential to shape the software industry for many years to come; hence it is important that the governance process for this revision reflect the needs of the broader software community. Our study employed structured interviews to capture data on open source developers' opinions about software licenses. We focused on how license choices impact the relationship that exists between open source and proprietary software. Our findings reveal that developers are primarily interested in flexibility and choice when considering a licensing approach. Most developers we interviewed used open source licenses to tap into the open source development approach. They chose this option for flexibility in developing a great product, without necessarily espousing any particular philosophy about how the software should be distributed. Developers also generally valued flexibility in the choice of business model for distributing software. The actions of the Free Software Foundation, which is revising the GPL, appear not to reflect the opinions of the broader community, but the agenda of a small minority that may represent as little as 10% of the open source developer community. Sharing data on the needs and perceived rights of developers, both open source and proprietary, will help the software community, industry experts and policymakers to champion a more flexible and responsive approach to sharing and developing software. Policy makers should work to preserve what has made the software ecosystem successful: innovation, community input and involvement, and developer freedom of choice.

A Research Agenda for Studying Open Source I: A Multi-Level Framework

This paper presents a research agenda for studying information systems using open source software A multi-level research model is developed at five discrete levels of analysis: (1) the artifact; (2) the individual; (3) the team, project, and community; (4) the organization; and (5) society. Each level is discussed in terms of key issues within the level. Examples are based on prior research. In a companion paper, [Niederman, et al 2006], we view the agenda through the lens of referent discipline theories

Free and open-source software

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Open Source Software: From Open Science to New Marketing Models

-Open source Software; Intellectual Property; Licensing; Business Model.

Understanding the current trends in mobile crowdsensing - a business model perspective: case MyGeo Trust

Crowdsensing and personal data markets that have emerged around it have rapidly gained momentum in parallel with the appearance of mobile devices. Collecting information via mobile sensors and the applications relying on these, the privacy of mobile users can be threatened, especially in the case of location-related data. In 2015, a research project called MyGeoTrust was initiated to investigate this issue. One aim of the project was to study the potential business models for a trusted, open-source crowdsourcing platform. This study, carried within the MyGeoTrust project, reviews existing literature about business models, location-based services, and open-source software development. It then investigates the relationship between these topics and mobile crowdsensing. As a whole, this thesis provides an overview on the development of location-based services, as well as the current trends and business models in crowdsensing. The empirical part of the thesis employs embedded case study methodology, acquiring empirical data from several sources. The analyzed case is the MyGeoTrust project itself, and other empirical data is collected via market analysis, interim reports, a user survey, and semi-structured interviews. This material forms the baseline for the empirical study and project-specific recommendations. The findings suggest that creating a two- or multisided platform is the most robust business model for mobile crowdsensing. The identified benefits of platform-based business models include facilitating the value exchange between self-governing groups and possibilities to build positive network effects. This is especially the case with open-source software and open data since the key value for users - or “the crowd” in other terms - is created through network effects. In the context of open business models, strategic planning, principally licensing, plays a central role. Also, for a differentiated platform like MyGeoTrust finding the critical mass of users is crucial, in order to create an appealing alternative to current market leaders. Lastly, this study examines how transformational political or legal factors may shape the scene and create requirements for novel, privacy-perceiving solutions. In the present case study, the upcoming European Union (EU) General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) legislation is a central example of such a factor

Some Policy Issues on Open Source and Proprietary Software

Software industry is a fast growing sector of the economy which is undergoing significant changes both for the presence of the open source mode of production and for the challenges of globalization and convergence with other industries. This paper analyses the role of open source software (OSS) on competition and innovation in the software industry and debates the economic rationales for promoting the adoption of OSS by national and local governments.software industry, open source software, patent system

Open Source: Concepts, Benefits, and Challenges

With the emergence of free and open source software (F/OSS) projects (e.g. Linux) as serious contenders to well-established proprietary software, advocates of F/OSS are quick to generalize the superiority of this approach to software development. On the other hand, some well-established software development firms view F/OSS as a threat and vociferously refute the claims of F/OSS advocates. This article represents a tutorial on F/OSS that tries objectively to identify and present open source software\u27s concepts, benefits, and challenges. From our point of view, F/OSS is more than just software. We conceptualize it as an IPO system that consists of the license as the boundary of the system, the community that provides the input, the development process, and the software as the output. After describing the evolution and definition of F/OSS, we identify three approaches to benefiting from F/OSS that center on (1) the software, (2) the community, and (3) the license respectively. Each approach is fit for a specific situation and provides a unique set of benefits and challenges. We further illustrate our points by refuting common misconceptions associated with F/OSS based upon our conceptual framework

Open Source Law, Policy and Practice

This book examines various policies, including the legal and commercial aspects of the Open Source phenomenon. Here, ‘Open Source’ is adopted as convenient shorthand for a collection of diverse users and communities, whose differences can be as great as their similarities. The common thread is their reliance on, and use of, law and legal mechanisms to govern the source code they write, use, and distribute. The central fact of open source is that maintaining control over source code relies on the existence and efficacy of intellectual property (‘IP’) laws, particularly copyright law. Copyright law is the primary statutory tool that achieves the end of openness, although implemented through private law arrangements at varying points within the software supply chain. This dependent relationship is itself a cause of concern for some philosophically in favour of ‘open’, with some predicting (or hoping) that the free software movement will bring about the end of copyright as a means for protecting software