William Crenshaw
English 101-002
Susan L. Eller
April 10, 2011
The Future is Open
	"Give me liberty or give me death! I am tired of all these restrictions on everything.” I said. Free Open Source Software is software that is open source and free of restrictions on what you can do with it. This type software has a long history, and due to its recent high adoption rate it is a current phenomenon. I personally have experience with FOSS on my local computer since 2006. It all started off when Windows Me, a very infamous operating system known for its instability, started to break on us after 6 years of no maintenance. We got Firefox because my brother said it was a better web browser. To make a very long story short, slowly but surely over time FOSS began replacing the programs I had on Windows Me. It eventually enhanced and fixed Windows Me with third party fix hacks that are open source also. Later on in 2010, my Windows Me was almost ten years old and it is a bit embarrassing to use a ten year old operating system as my main operating system. At the time my entire system was using FOSS already, so the upgrade was pretty easy for me to adapt to. To make the adaptation easier I chose a desktop environment close to Windows Me's graphical user interface, and I treated this new operating system as a fresh new start. Now, my entire network is powered by free open source software. My actions and experience is really the echoes of the environment around me, and our world is actually in the brink of a major change in all areas including software.
	According to my experiences with Microsoft Windows, I can tell Windows 4.00, also known as Windows 95, and later versions of Microsoft Windows did this behavior of decay. This behavior of decay is what I perceive as the corporations intentions to cripple their software in order to force customers to buy new ones. I am not the only person who noticed this. Another thing that people and I noticed is that computer hardware is getting cheaper and faster, but commercial proprietary software is just getting significantly expensive. These companies are afraid of lost in profit, even though they have 90% or more of the market in all degrees, and they are extremely rich. They hog all the code and not share it. There for the community does not know how to fix it or customize it. Furthermore these companies want the people to buy a copy of their software, and this is intended for every computer the individual or group is going to use the software in. Their licenses restrict People from doing anything else besides what the companies would do. These companies are very oppressive to the people. The people do not like to have an oppressive force, so the people search for alternatives and they find good if not better software online for free.
	Due to the Information Age, free open source software adoption has risen dramatically. The internet has information about free software and the philosophy of which they are built from. Because of this, traditional commercial proprietary software has threatening competition, community built software that is free to remix, share, and build upon. This software is built by the community for the community. An example of this is GNU/Linux, which is a community built operating system. This software has gotten the attention of many people. It is built from the ground up as a 100% UNIX clone, and it is very powerful. It is very popular in servers and in super computers, due to its superior performance, free or reasonable cost, and not oppressing. There are no oppressing restrictions in GNU/Linux's licenses.
 	People hate oppressive powers. There is evidence in history and in current events. This topic tends to be related to the current revolutions happening in the Arab World. The cause of these revolutions is an oppressive government and oppressed people. This is a very reactive combination. It is like putting water (the oppressive government) on potassium (the people). If there is enough water on the potassium, it will catch on fire. This means the people are angry and emotionally on fire, because they are simply in pursuit of happiness. Basically the people are angry at corrupted oppressive companies and are doing something about it. This is what is it like with the FOSS community and the closed sourced companies. The Free Open Source Software community is revolting for the oppressed people of the computing world. This is truly a revolution happening for a while and it will not end anytime soon. This freedom revolution challenges the oppressive traditions established at the nineteenth century. It is not just happening in software area, but in all degrees of Intellectual property and information. Intellectual property consists of certain things created by the mind. An example would be fan art of a existing piece of art, or music you listen to.
	The information age will certainly change traditional ways of economics. From closed and oppressive software to open and free software. It will be great if the companies got the message, shared the code, eliminate the restrictions, reduce prices, communicate with the community, and still profit from it. There are many other ways companies can profit then besides proprietary software. Look at Red Hat, Inc.'s business model. They operate completely differently from Apple, Microsoft, etc. Red Hat's customer support is subscription based. As for the code, the software is community created and with professional quality control. Because of this they can get more people to develop the software, improve it, and make it secure. This is one example of how the future of business is going to be like. The Information Age may become the Information Revolution. "For years, Linux hackers revolted against Microsoft and proprietary software developers, turning Finnish programmer Linus Torvalds' Linux kernel into a kind of living, breathing operating system. More a way of thinking than a technology, Linux started as a movement of hackers who pursued it for the love, not for the bucks." (Fattah) Because of this, the future is open.