The IT Pro Podcast: Is this the beginning of the end for open source?
There’s positive momentum in the open source community, but key players are questioning its longevity
Open source software can be found in a huge number of businesses' stacks. Whether it’s to save on expensive software, to fix a problem that a devoted hobbyist has a solution for, or because of its lively developer community, open source solutions run throughout the tech sector.
However, in recent years security concerns have damaged the perception of open source software and vulnerabilities like Log4Shell left some IT leaders with headaches they aren’t keen to repeat. As the market expands, some open source developers find themselves under more pressure than ever before and questions have been raised around the duty of larger firms to help support the community they rely on.
In this episode, Jane and Rory speak to Keumars Afifi-Sabet, features editor at IT Pro and our specialist covering open source, to discuss the challenges facing the open source community and ask whether it will survive in its current form.
Highlights
“There are lots of open source software out there that might only have one or two maintainers working on them. And maybe one day they decide they don't want to do it anymore, and they start a new project. But by this point, thousands of companies might be using it. So you get into a position where who's maintaining this piece of software?”
“Because there's been this history of animosity from corporations like Google, like Amazon, AWS, towards the open source ecosystem, maintainers are inherently a little bit untrustworthy of this involvement and the growing influence of curation.”
“As Amanda Brock put it, who is the CEO of OpenUK, for open source either the community wins in the next five years, or it loses, and everything collapses.”
Read the full transcript here.
Footnotes
- What is open source?
- Existential tensions put open source on path to crisis point
- What is the Log4Shell vulnerability?
- Open source in open rebellion - can Google bring peace to the developer community?
- Microsoft Azure CTO hails 'most loved' Rust as the successor to C and C++
- Open source leaders call for permanent government funding package
- Linux Foundation unveils ‘World of Open Source’ research initiative
- Google unveils new Assured Open Source Software service
- Meta passes PyTorch ownership to Linux Foundation in a bid to improve transparency
- Daphne's Catflap
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