IBM has a nice paper [PDF] (link from Groklaw), which - among other things - presents an illuminating metaphor (and group exercise) for the difference between traditional software engineering, and the open-source kind.
A group of people are drawing an elephant together. In the traditional world, each is assigned a part of the elephant and given an overhead foil to draw on. They can speak together (simulating meetings), but they aren't allowed to look at each others' foils, much less put one on top of another. At the end, the foils are collected and stacked on the overhead projector.
In the open collaborative version, each person is still assigned a part of the elephant, but everyone is drawing on the same sheet of paper. This means they can see what everyone else is doing, and automatically adapt their part so it fits the emerging whole.
IBM presents this in the context of improving communications within a company; but as an illustration of the difference between proprietary and open-source software it is very effective.
⇦ Idea: mat2mat protocol | ⇨ Let me check my notes... |
