Interview with Simon Phipps about Open Source
It's very very good so start downloading right now!
Today I was catching up with a bunch of FLOSS Weekly podcast episodes. One episode really cought my attention, the FLOSS Weekly 39: Simon Phipps episode. Simon Phipps is the chief open source officer of Sun Microsystems and talks about open source in general, having a business strategy based on open source and how Sun has come to be the company it is today in regard of open source. It's an amazing interview!
Have you ever been in a discussion with someone about Open Source and the reason either for it to exist or for a company do adopt it? I have, and I always struggle with the explanation. I usually find it difficult to give a conclusive explanation of the business value of open source. Usually I get the feeling that the person I'm failing to convince just get's reinforced in his or hers opposite beliefs. I'm always annoyed by that since I know that open source is a good thing and for that reason I tend to stay away from trying to convince people.
I think listening to this interview can answer all of those questions with an intelligent diskussion. I will listen to it several more times for sure!
More people must have found it good since in the following FLOSS Weekly episode 40 the hosts Randal Schwartz and Leo Laporte talked about the positive feedback and how Simon Phipps appearently had got so much into the discussion that he now was thinking about writing a book. I would pre-order that book today!
I just feel good right now, I love hearing really smart people talking about great things like this :)