Innovators who are interested in Open Source
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Developers Publishers
Developers publishers are IT developers-companies who publish the original source code.
When developer publishers need Open Source. -
Public Sector (Government Technologies, Gov Tech)
Part of the economy is completely controlled by the state; Government: Central and local administration, municipalities and mayor’s offices.
When the Public sector needs Open Source. -
Civil Society (Civic Technologies, Civic Tech)
A set of citizens who are not close to the levers of state power; a set of social relations outside the framework of government-power and commercial structures.
Why open source is useful for civil society.. -
Developers-individuals
Individual developers – natural persons.
Why Open Source is beneficial for Developers-individuals. -
End Users – Business
Entrepreneurs, SMEs and large businesses looking to improve efficiency, reduce costs and increase revenue.
Why Open Source is beneficial to end users – businesses.
Open-Source Software monetization – Details.
What are the benefits of using Open Source?
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Knowledge Exchange
Open source allows a community of contributors to develop and improve existing source code.
This allows you to share knowledge and brings a variety of skills and experience to your team. In turn, this significantly reduces development costs and allows you to constantly improve and update your product.
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Adaptability
Software, hardware and content are developed to solve a specific set of problems. When a developer, engineer, or architect designs a product, it must function in a particular way, for a particular client, in a particular area. Open source code allows you to modify and adapt the product for different geographical areas, for different contexts and users, as well as for solving a different set of problems.
Larger companies such as Microsoft and Oracle must ensure that any software developed works in all geographies, is understandable in many languages, and is compatible with a wide range of devices.
As an early stage venture, this will require a large amount of financial and non-financial resources. Some sources claim that choosing a proprietary technology limits the lifespan of your product and increases market risk. The community of contributors can enable wider adoption of your product because it allows deployment in a local context with very few restrictions.
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Safety
Because the source code is public, open source reveals bugs or weaknesses in the system, which improves security. The only way to prove that a codebase is secure is to make it public, open, and verifiable by others. There have been far too many examples of companies saying «trust us» with the security of their codebase only to have their insecure code end up being infected by hackers. The open source code allows the public to test and comment.
Users and the contributor community can also help identify design flaws or bugs, strengthening security through user collaboration.
