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January 13, 2006

OSBC and the changing face of Open Source

Speaking of conferences, OSBC will be happening in a few weeks in San Francisco. Matt and the rest of the OSBC team have put together another fantastic program for this year. Attending last year was a real eye (and ear) opener for me. Although having spent several years moving Open Source into the enterprise via many projects in some really high-profile companies, I think OSBC was the first time I actually heard senior management level people speak openly about their use of Open Source. Open Source companies such as SpikeSource and Optaros came out of "hiding" at OSBC. Companies that were betting their complete business model on Open Source. I'm sure there will be more of the same at this year's event.

The conference is still unique in the fact that it manages to combine both the business perspective with the community, development and licensing aspects of Open Source without compromising on any of the individual subjects.

Something that I didn't really expect was lack of influence OSBC has had in Europe. Of course OSBC is a very US-centric conference (still no sign of an OSBC Europe anytime soon), but the subjects discussed there are certainly global in nature. And yet, Europe still seems some way behind the US when it comes to enterprise Open Source. Maybe I'm wrong on that - and it would be interesting to hear what companies like the above have to say on how their business models are perceived in European organizations.

Unfortunately it doesn't seem like I'm going to make it over to San Francisco this year (I'm really going to miss going bridge-watching again). My wife thinks we have other things higher on our budget-priority list at the moment - and she's probably right.

Update: Looks like I may get to go after all. Stay tuned.

Posted by Matthew at January 13, 2006 06:05 PM

Comments

what a good husband :)

Posted by: Babsy at January 14, 2006 08:01 AM

What has changed?

Posted by: Steve Mallett at January 17, 2006 09:19 PM