Abstract:
Higher education has long valued the collaborative production and sharing of knowledge.
Thus, the rise of software communities powered by the near frictionless cost of the Internet
and open source software production techniques seems a natural fit for colleges and
universities. One vexing challenge, however, has been finding a common legal and policy
framework for software contributions, licensing, and distribution of collaboratively
developed work. In the absence of a common framework, heterogeneous policies and
licenses will remain an unhealthy drag on considerable economies that we can harness
when we benefit from others’ investments. Colleges and universities, as the primary beneficiary
of software sharing, must be proactive in creating, adopting, and advocating for a
common framework if we are to ever take full advantage of these opportunities.
We are grateful that the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation recognizes this problem and
funded the October 2006 gathering of some thought leaders to work on these
challenges. Our distinguished attendees were drawn from university legal counsel,
technology transfer offices, open source projects, governmental funding agencies, and
foundations, with representatives from multiple continents. We worked hard via
electronic communication before the summit, during two days of intensive face-to-face
discussions, and through much follow up afterward. The electronic communications were
open to all at http://collabtools.org.
This document is one of the work products of the summit, and it includes a set of
educational materials for an institution’s engagement with open source application
software. Action and implementation will be the key arbiter of value, and we urge
institutions, projects, and funding agencies to engage in the ongoing work of refining and
implementing the work started here.
