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It brought the process of community building down to earth, so I could relate to it more. Before the symposium, I thought of open source community building as an arcane process, wrought through arcane magic by wizards who possessed an inexplicable mystic ability to solve disputes instantly. It seemed to be a process that happened gradually over eons, and through an impossible sequence of miracles.
Now, it feels like a process which is difficult but possible. Building a thriving open source community requires good negotiation skills, not just good coding skills. On that concept alone, the type of success Thunderbird enjoys can be duplicated.
The way David and Dan presented a person-to-person skit was a brilliant method of delivery. It removed the illusion that Mozilla developers were inapproachable legends and connected them with the audience. They immediately seemed like real people we could relate to and interact with.
After that skit, there was no doubt that David is a master negotiator, and that Dan is a veteran in interpersonal relationships.
I was expecting a new viewpoint on what Open Source meant for the world. Instead, I got a brief introduction on what Open Access was, and how it affected the economy of post-secondary institutions. I understand that efforts are being made to move the monopolistic dominance away from the publishers and towards online libraries that spread the journals to a larger audience. I don't know how successful it has been, or if it affects Seneca, or if it involves any open source projects or communities.
The presentation aimed to compare "production, sharing, reputation management, and sustainability models" of both open access and open source. He covered these topics for open access, but not for open source. That comparison, the crux of the talk, did not occur.
It was probably a timing issue. The speech was halted mid-topic. Chan simply did not have enough time to cover the topics in sufficient detail, but felt that detail was a duty that could not be ignored.
== Comparison on Open Source Opinions ==
David and Dan treat Open Source as a community, and promote its growth as such. They encourage the open participation of the public while steering growth in a constructive direction.
These sets of opinions don't seem comparableto any fine degree. One deals with the community, while the other deals with the license to spread information freely. They are neither mutually inclusive or mutually exclusive.
Were my views affected by FSOSS? I definitely had an informed view of OS before the conference, thanks to Dave Humphreys. I'd like to think that my views were developed in class and strengthened by the examples of OS communities represented at the conference.
The Thunderbird community was an amazing experience. I've never witnessed a community whose only purpose is to nurture communities.
I wasn't touched by the concept of open access. If I needed information, Wikipedia and Google are always available through the web, and they both provide sufficient detail. For anything more sophisticated than what Wikipedia and Google can provide, I would seek a professional opinion. If it deals with medicine, I would need a professional opinion anyways to obtain a prescription. The use of journals just seems to be lost.
