[-empyre-] // The Emperors new source code //

[Julian Oliver]

The reality is that very few academics and artists actually know what Open
Source is, where and why the term was introduced, the difference between Free
Software and Freeware yet are more than happy to talk about it all ad infinitum;
Open Source has been a academic cash-cow and a great cultural love-in for the
media-art scene. 'Open Source' sounds a little bit technical - a bit 'digital' -
contemporary and a lot more fashionable than the word 'participatory' which is,
in fact, the word they're looking for.. 

The result is a vast number of talks given on Open Source Architecture (what?)
the postulation of Open Source Governments (que?) and countless blogs on Open
Source Cooking (umm..) and Open Source Crochet (wass?). 

Papers given on Open Source hailing its messianic power as a design model are
given in publically-funded university conferences on closed-source operating
systems (OSX/Windows), the PDFs of which are locked up in pay-per-use services
like JSTOR under non-pro-copy-Copyright licenses.

In the absense of /actual/ source code, the term Open Source has been so widely
abused it makes little real sense anymore. It has become absurd. The term
'participatory' however has lost little of its shine. 

Who's brave enough to use it?

-- 
Julian Oliver
home: New Zealand
based: Berlin, Germany 
currently: Berlin, Germany
about: http://julianoliver.com