ideOS.org

ideas Open Source!

ideOS is an attempt at collaborative efforts in arriving at new designs, products, and services for a variety of domains and industries.

While there are available, in a scattered and diffused manner, a number of such collaborative efforts, we feel that a collaborative, community platform that is focused on new designs, new products & new services has potential.

ideOS is open source. The idea of open source considered here is similar to that pioneered by the open source and free software movements. For those who are not acquainted with these movements, the following provides a crude summary:

1. Develop products and services collaboratively.
2. Let this collaboration be done in an “open format” such that the end product or design is more robust than one that could be produced by closed and proprietary models.
3. Have flexible intellectual property rules such that IP acts as an empowering and motivating agent for innovation, rather than as a constraint.
4. Let the products and services be so designed to provide highest value to the society at the lowest possible cost. Please note that I have used the word society and not the end user.

I’d recommend having a look at the following pages to get a better idea of the open source and free software movements: Free Software Movement, Open Source Initiative

The above is only a rather crude form of stating the open source & free software movement principles. Please also note that while in many forums people discuss open source and free software movements in the same breath, the fundamental motivations for these movements are rather quite different – open source has a rather operational ideology (more robust products), while the free software movement has “political” or “societal” ideologies (end users should have more control over what they use). But for a start, we won’t get into all that.

Put simply, the IPs developed at ideOS can be used flexibly by other individuals or organizations to further innovate and add value to better products or services. I will figure out more precise ways of terming all these legalese over time.

The goal of ideOS is not however just to develop new designs. The ultimate goal is to enable new designs, products and services to add real value to consumers. Hence there is a good possibility that the ideOS community could be working with the industries and business in this regard, without compromising its open source nature. For instance, we could work with an auto major to test new engine designs that were designed by the ideOS volunteers. (“Open source models in proprietary model companies” is not exactly an oxymoron – it has happened in a big way in the IT industry with the likes of Sun and IBM co-opting open source models as part of their traditional closed-end models)

Am I talking sense? Can open source work in non-information-technology industries? Or is just an aberration that has worked in the IT industry only because of the hacker culture that dominates that industry?

For god’s sake, don’t look at me like that for an answer - I don’t have one. I appreciate (as much as a chap like me can appreciate such finer aspects) that the goal is a rather idealistic and lofty one, and you are excused for thinking it rather wooly-headed. Whether it is indeed possible to achieve what we have set to achieve, only time will tell. But I think it is an experiment worth trying.

Based on preliminary research, ideOS intends to try this for the following domains (right now, just one L, will hopefully get more!):

• Alternative Energy ideOS – see details on our algOS – Algae Energy Open Source Project

If you are interested in knowing more about Ideos.org or how to become a volunteer for the above-mentioned project, please send a mail to info@ideos.org .

Thanks!

NS

See also: ideOS blog, Free, Open Source Software @ ideOS, Open Source Jobs Search

Some fun stuff – Mindless Meanderings