Open Source Use Survey

The EU-funded FLOSSpols project is carrying out a followup survey of Open Source / Free Software developers worldwide.

Rishab Aiyer Ghosh, the programme leader and author of the findings paper from the previous report, writes about the survey:

The EU-funded FLOSSPOLS project is carrying out a survey of developers worldwide. This is a follow-up to the original FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open Source Software) survey in 2002, which was one of the first and most comprehensive surveys of developers - who they are, how they work and why they do it. The new survey aims to provide an update, include new developers, and answer some of the questions that were raised by the first one. In particular, how do developer communities help in learning skills and generating employment, and why is the level of participation by women so low?

According to Danese Cooper, the self-proclaimed Open Source Diva, who recently left Sun to join Intel, Ghosh will also be joining her and other notables on the new OSI board.

On a sidenote, this jumble of acronyms (FLOSS, FOSS, OSS/FS) is getting out of hand; if only people could be persuaded to settle on a single, easy to pronounce, collective name for Open Source and Free Software... Maybe we should just call it Commons Software, and hope that it doesn't give rise to more "Open Source is communist" trolling.