Archive for December, 2017

The inspiring local confernence: SFSCon

2017-12-17 15:36

New location, some little problems but an overall interesting and inspiring program. Very positive aspect: A single conference language.

Assuming that details or video clips are available, I won’t sum up anything but just give some very specific impressions noteworthy in my opinion. The shift in focus from just FOSS to more socio-economic aspects is very refreshing and i laid my focus on these talks as well:

Danese Coopers keynote about the evolution of the OSS-movement toward the solution of the philosophical questions. Bottom line: Act with enlightened self interest. The 4 tips for a fulfilled life: 1) become a mentor, 2) serve non-profit boards, 3) search for fun and good things, 4) hack your company.

Mirko Böhms talk about governance between community and business draws a picture of the current status of FOSS in relation to other models of development and shows the lessons to be learned by the contact of FOSS to business. Bottom line: Governance need emerges with a growing community and the community development takes place in a collaborative space of ~80% volume of a product. The residual 20% lie in a competitive space where the company can take advantage. The numbers are clearly indicative and are obviously oriented on the pareto principle, which reminds me on the five fingers, the optimal team size of five members and the leadership span which emerges out of this number symbology. Not by chance some optimally efficient sweet spots are recursively self emerging….

Daniele Gobetti shows the impressive lesson of what happens when the stack is gliding out of control. Github as a single point of failure blocked the development with heavy implications due to the DMCA out of a rouge attack. The git repository and the code was at no point endangered, but the community collaboration and main communication channel was taken down. The decentral internet infrastructure is endangered effectively by single large concentration points which offer convenient services and centralize the system more than desirable.

 

A lot of other intersting talks with special insights were given, but the above messages are my key takeaways.