Being a commercial open source company isn’t just making your code available under an open source license. The way you work should emulate the successful structure of open source projects. In our case, this means a transformation towards transparency and being open for participation.
You may have noticed that our development team has moved their corporate blogs outside the firewall and project pages into a public wiki. This is a step beyond the more well known ROI of blogging, which focuses on outcomes instead of sharing the process. Some of the things you can find there:
- Developer blogs by Andy, Chris, Kirsten, Luke, Matt and Zak
- The Socialtext Open project
- The SocialCalc project
- The Wikiwyg project
- The Unplugged project
- Wiki Web Services projects
- Wiki Conversion Toolbox
I’m sure that some of the blogging will air some dirty laundry, but they say sunshine is the best disinfectant. We’ve been unique in letting any employee blog on Socialtext.com and have active debates inside. Some developers have yet to blog and there will be some things best kept behind the firewall, but day to day work will happen on the Open Source Wiki and we are making our code repository open next month.
This is already changing the way we communicate. Trusting employees with the former message. Sharing our warts and plans with you and even the former competition. It may not be pretty, some of it mundane, but it is real and you are welcome to participate.
And if you prefer to participate in person, the Wikithon is in two weeks.
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