Jose Miguel Parrella

Great recap. I'm wondering what the community's take is on BSL [1] While not new (2013) I think there is a worthwhile pending debate on post-modern licensing given the increased attention put in the last year or so on funding/business models for open source as covered by Eghbal, Okoli/Nguyen and others. It's probably accepted without proof that well-established open source licenses will persist in the next decade as they have survived the cycle, yet might be under additional stress in the upcoming stage.

[1] http://monty-says.blogspot.com/2016/08/applying-business-source-licensi…

I'm reading the book. Although I do think Mr. Whitehurst put significant effort in structuring a framework around the strategy (rather than tactics) behind open organizations it was certainly refreshing to read (and, like Jono, identify with) some of the tactical things mentioned re. the role of mailing lists, IRC, etc.

What was particularly enlightening was the detail put into describing how meritocracy in an open organization does not equate to all voices being heard equally, and how self-made leaders bring meaning to the open concept. This makes the role of managers self-evident and the purpose of management moving to focusing on purpose and facilitation.

I would like to see the dialogue on open organizations and organizational maturity going. In the book there are mentions to organizations that fail to buy into the open concept: both big corporate as well as startups settling after periods of rapid growth. For Red Hat it seems like open organization comes as second nature due to open source and freedom being a core value. For companies not in the same vertical but that bring open into their practice, it looks like they are trying to reinvent and disrupt after pursuing purpose (customer service, agility, entering new markets, etc.) yet I think that for everything in between there has to be a number of enabling triggers - it could be evolving demographics, it could be shifting customer sentiment, or it could also be simply achieving a maturity stage where cogs on a wheel is not cutting it for ROI anymore.