I am a great supporter to judge the present by knowledge of the past. Over the past 25 years, one of the largest business and technology trends has been considered the open source revolution. The notion of sound good deal Sharing your source code may not yet be cemented in the eyes of many traditionalists, but the idea of taking advantage of the open source software. We quickly come to the point where almost all important non -zero software is, in one way or another, open. In all Android phones, all Mac computers, practically all traditional web technologies: servers, databases, browsers, compilers; All foundations are open.
This contrasts strongly when I wrote my diploma thesis “open source software in the commercial environment”, shortly after the ESR wrote “the cathedral and the bazaar”, when Microsoft and its gigantic code of code with closed source were used commercially.
So why? What has changed? Did people suddenly realize that, as Raymond said, the “bazaar” model was the right way to follow? No. The introduction of ideas alone rarely makes the difference and, in any case, the concept of distributed labor, by the individual interest working on a coherent whole is not exactly a break.
In fact, the development of software, as a process, has always been perfect for decentralization – the only lacking thing was an omnipresent communication infrastructure for developers – a way for them to share the code transparently and work easily. It is not surprising that the rise of the Internet with CVS, IRC, Usenet and the diffusion lists coincided with that of open source software.
So, was it therefore provided by the previous “cathedral” model?
In fact, yes. It has facilitated a lot of commercial things that we could constantly consider “the plumbing of value”; First, he prompted practitioners – he paid the developers to spend their time and energy on a project. Second, it provided all the support assets necessary to allow the development to occur (hardware, software, tools, educational equipment, etc.). Third, he acted as a sink for the funds – he collected payments from those who benefited from the work done. In a word, he took care of cash flows, picking up a well -stored profit in exchange for activation and incentive to produce solutions.
Assumed at the beginning to be important, it turned out to be less; It turns out that people often work on software just for fun. However, we cannot deny that this “plumbing value” always pays an important role in human activity and the provision of services.
So what does that tell us about the future?
Business, and in particular the service industry, have so far followed a “cathedral” approach to the Commission, the provision and the management of services that would fall under this “value plumbing”. We could recognize it by close coordination, forced consistency, explicit descending management, centralization and rigidity. The fact that we have singular legal entities with authority and responsibility on large production expanses of production is a very clear signal.
Ebay, as a empowering platform, was a pioneer in a really global decentralization; It worked as a key catalyst for small businesses and cottage industries in the developed world (not to mention a lucrative fund source for some of the least scrupulous operators in compatible parts of the world in development). With the web 2.0 platform and the mobile (which is strongly tangled), we see a new class of decentralization applications. The so-called “sharing economy” is starting to train with Uber, Airbnb and Taskrabbit as notable examples. Like eBay, these operators reduce the relevance of an entire class of “structural intermediaries” and replace their “value lead” with a large manufacturer of technologically followed matches.
The high level deconstruction that they involve is generally delivered with a certain accidental degree of opening (the “driver costs” of Uber, the “cleaning load” of Airbnb; it is typical to learn more about your paired service provider). So, that taxi companies, hostels and unqualified labor outfits have key examples of “decentralized services”? Where do their benefits which allow them to be reduced to an evolutionary automaton so easily come from?
They manage their reputation (through basic mouths, marketing and advertising), they manage their workforce (through finance, recruitment and agreements) manage their market (by adapting to the levels of evolution of supply and demand) and they manage their risks (verification, compensation, insurance and obligations).
Although they cannot seriously claim to have created really new or open markets, they get closer. In the world of open source software, they are a kind of sharing sharing. Not quite commercial, but not really free either. There are still singular entities, matches, behind the decentralized veneer, as is obvious when you go to the statistics and technosocial Germany and see that the only type of Uber you can ask is a regular taxi sanctioned by the government.
So, although these are not yet there, these are the beginnings of a social change in expectations; As consumers, we expect greater transparency in the operations of our supplier (to know the name of our driver originally precise of the rubber in our coaches) and greater freedom on the selection of our service; As an individual, we expect a greater capacity to sell our skills, time, goods or potential; As a business, we expect a reduction in obstacles to the entry into the markets that we want to compete. Just like in open-source software, it will not take long before sufficiently good amateur legions (or professionals who seek to go rider alone) are in competition, in the manner of the bazaar, on an equal footing or superior to the cathedrals of the industry.
And the idea of ”bazaar services” is the possible conclusion of this social change. As open source software is practically zero barrier to entry and fluid in terms of leadership and authority, we will find the world of services. The concerns are the same as 20 years ago. The answers are similar.
The writing of software was only the first thing to become fundamentally decentrally, and only because of the natural flavor of its inhabitants and its nature of being entirely based on information. With Ethereum, Crypto-Law, Web 3.0 and acabitations, all aspects of services will follow the same road. The idea of an organization or a rigid company will evaporate and on the left will be the true essence of models of human interaction, polished only by the opening and theoretical mathematics of information. While once the “interaction-manager”, “value-plumber” — or “corporation” in short — would be subject to laws on emerging behavior, this allowed, strict legality of emerging behavior will become more and more relevant because it will become radicalist.
We will start to see a world without intermediaries, intermediaries, trusted authorities, where the services are not only provided, but also announced, found, assorted and insured, directly from the supplier to consumption. The interaction models arise and do not continue through the awkward and ineffective legal system and the rules of slow and rigid companies, but rather by the emerging effects intrinsically adaptable of flexible, agile and direct economic incentives. This is where we head and if he delivers as well as open source software, he certainly cannot come quickly enough.
Can we make benefits of this new social model? My opinion is a resounding yes; The profits will, as always, come from the maintenance of human needs (perceived) or the supply of efficiency gains to people encouraged to recognize and deploy them. However, the types of lucrative models are not yet obvious. Do not expect the for -lucrative entity now like any, or you will be stuck like those looking for the next Microsoft in 2000 and place their money in Vmlinux and Redhat. What we think we are large differentiaries who now prove to be basic products in 20 years, as well as operating systems and navigators in 1995.
To understand where these differentiators can first require understanding of what will be made of products. Certain food for reflection: what happens if “merchandise” turns out to be a digital market, entirely neutral, open and without confidence? Omnipresent “value filling”, commercial logic evolving constantly while maintaining the preparation that everyone, who is, can participate in … Bazar Services.
5/4/2015 Addendum: having revisited CatbI have to apologize for my abuse of Raymond’s analogies; The original work concerned the distinction between traditional work practices (mainly commercial software, but it included OSS such as GNU) and decentralized work practices (which we now tend to consider as a development of open source software), rather than strictly owner / commercial vs thread. Still in circumstances, the concept of decentralization in the development of software is widespread and correlated with open source development. Interestingly, even apart from OSS, part of the agile methodology (I think Scrum) could be supported to join this general trend towards self-organization, decentralization and the operation without authority of the bazaar.
