A new paper from Forrester Research concerning Open Source for Microsoft discusses the potential of the development model. Sure, you have the necessary portion GPL bashing folklore in there (which unfortunately prevents the substancial criticism that should be raised by neutral parties) but as a Microsoft document it sounds like Gorbatschev 1989 in Berlin, as Brenno de Winter predicted quite a while ago. What Forrester got right here is in particular the concept of best practise transfer, an embracement of crowd-based business processes:
Model internal reuse strategies on the example of successful open source communities. When it comes to software reuse, open source projects have achieved in practice what many commercial organizations have long desired: high levels of reusable components that enable rapid assembly of new solutions. There’s substance to the argument that the more transparent a component’s development, the more likely that other developers will be interested in using it. And if new developers can also make changes or extensions to apply a component into a new context, so much the better.
More thoughts should be spent on that transfer because open source as such may not be commercially sustainable for some companies. It is worth to investigate how self-selection by professionals may improve labour allocation and help to overcome ICT specialist shortage. Google is an example for a company that seems to incorporate this element in its business and development process quite successfully.
Sköne Oke 