My Open Source Experience Podcast

Open source can be intimidating, and sometimes hiding in plain sight.In the past decade the telecommunications industry has been going through their open source transformation journey, which is bumpy at times. This is an industry segment that is highly regulated and standardized, which can clash with the fast-paced and flexible nature of open source.In this My Open Source Experience podcast episode, Magnus Buhrgard shares some of his insights about the telecommunications industry, and its relationship to open source.Learn more about:- Open source initiatives and projects in the telecommunications industry- Why mostly telecom operators are the ones who start new open source projects- What middle-layer management dislikes about open source- Business reasons and value to adopt and invest in open source Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the kick-off episode of Season 3!The first episode of the season touches on a 5 important topic areas that are key to the open source ecosystem, one way or the other: events, AI, open source maintainers, Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) and open source in the public sector.Episode highlights:- Stephen Walli shares his experience and thoughts about the value of open source events- Ildikó highlights some key upcoming open source conferences around the globe- Ria Farrell Schalnat points out some of the challenges in the AI space regarding licensing and copyright- Kelsey Hightower talks about open source maintainers, and highlight some important differences between open source as a license type and as a community- Federico Gonzalez Waite shares some learnings from the journey he had with the Mexican government through their open source transformation- Ildikó shares some important details about the CRA Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The recent times in open source have been bringing some changes, which connects back to governments' recognition of the importance to protect the cyber space. As modern life depends more and more on connected digital infrastructure, cybersecurity has become the center of attention, and concern. All digital products and services depend on open source software to varying extent, which brings open source into the spotlight, and highlights everyone's responsibilities in maintaining not just their own proprietary code, but also the open source projects they depend on.In this segment on the My Open Source Experience podcast, Ria Farrell Schalnat, Greg Kroah-Hartman, Michael Dexter and Tom Sadler share their stories and experiences in the areas of legislations, CVEs and cybersecurity, sustainability of open source projects and InnerSource. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Open source isn't just for software developers. In fact, there is a large legal community that is focusing on licenses, intellectual property, legislations and more to understand how these all apply to open source, and what is enforceable and how. However, law and legislations develop and evolve on a very different pace than technology and open source, which makes the intersection of these areas rather tricky. Have you faced any challenges throughout your journey?In this My Open Source Experience podcast episode Ildiko and Phil explore the intersection of law and open source with Ria Farrell Schalnat. Ria started out as a computer programmer, then she ventured over to the field of law, but always stayed close to tech through copyright, intellectual property, and eventually open source. Ria has a comprehensive understanding of these areas and shares some of her experiences throughout her career journey that made a difference for her and the law firms and companies she worked for.Learn more about:- Why learning is not an exercise to do alone- Conferences are often underrated, and how you can organize one yourself if there isn't any available in your area- The conflict between how laws and legislations are created and how software, open source or proprietary, is developed- Why investing in upstream work and participating in open source projects are necessary to be successful- SBOMs and cybersecurity Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Maintaining a local fork of an open source project is like maintaining an illusion. It only gives momentarily control and becomes expensive to keep up over time. Have you experienced that already?This My Open Source Experience podcast episode evolves around this topic and explores why and how to invest in open source projects, including how to pick which ones to rely on, what to consider when setting up your organizational structure, and why avoid maintaining local forks.- Austen Bryan covers the benefits of relying on OSS projects, and how to pick the right ones.- Samson Goddy talks about why roles like Developer Relations don't belong in the marketing department- Greg Kroah-Hartman shares why you don't want to maintain a local fork- Federico Gonzalez Waite talks about educating people about open source and guiding a large organization through an open source transition- Michael Dexter shares his thoughts and experience with regulations, patents. copyright laws and how they've been affecting software development and the FOSS movement- Tom Sadler shares the benefits of investing in upstream work, and why maintaining a local fork turned out to be a bad idea for his company Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Open source investment and involvement are still considered risky and expensive, even though there are individuals, companies and studies that say the opposite. What's your take on this?In this My Open Source Experience podcast episode Ildiko and Phil explore corporate involvement in the Linux kernel community with Greg Kroah-Hartman. Greg has been a long-term Linux kernel contributor and maintainer, being responsible for the stable branches. Greg had both personal interest in getting involved, as well as motivation from the company he worked for at the time. The Linux kernel has been a popular choice to build an operating system, and therefore corporate investment has been strong in the project with 80% - 85% of the contributors being involved in the community as part of their paid job.Learn more about:- What individuals get out of working upstream- Common mistakes and misconceptions companies have about involvement in open source projects- Cultural challenges and examples to resolve them- What successful companies did to thrive with OSS- How to be proactive to sync product and open source project deliveries Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We often talk about collaboration in the context of open source, or at least externally to a company with partner organizations. However, especially in larger corporations, cross-team work is just as important as the teamwork itself. Working with other teams is often more complicated than it needs to be, for various reasons. These teams could be in different countries, or the company's structure might not allow them to work together efficiently. What can you do to fix that?In this episode of the My Open Source Experience podcast Tom Sadler talks about how he explored open source and InnerSource, and how he became an upstream contributor through the latter. Tom also shares how InnerSource helped teams within BBC to work together more efficiently, and how it allowed the company to work upstream as well.Learn more about:- Why and how to roll out InnerSource within a company- Metrics to measure team efficiency- Do you need an ISPO/OSPO?- What you need to know to consume open source safely and efficiently- Why you need to avoid having internal forks of open source projects Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If you want your company to be successful you need to deliver value to your customers or you do'n't have a business. Using open source software is appealing, since the source code is available online free of charge. However, as much as it is available to you it is also available to others. So, what's your differentiator? What's your business value?In this episode of the My Open Source Experience podcast Austen Bryan, Ildiko and Phil dig into the challenges of incorporating open source into business, with intention. Austen has a software engineering degree along with an MBA, which has been giving him a very comprehensive insight and knowledge about the software ecosystem. Before moving to Defense Unicorns, he worked for the United States Air Force with a focus on acquisitions, and gained deep insight into how government agencies operate, including the supply chain for software and other resources. Austen learned about open source while he was working for the government, and now he's with a company that based its entire business on open source. So, why and how do they do it?Learn more about:- Defense Unicorns, and how they leverage and embrace open source- How to find business value around open source software- Benefits that don't come in the form of money and income- How to decide whether or not you should open source any of your projects Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Building a business strategy is hard in general, and when open source becomes part of the equation it can get even more challenging.In the recent past there were multiple examples of companies changing the license on their open source project to something less or not at all open. This is often harmful to the companies themselves and the pattern is always harmful tot he open source ecosystem.In this episode of the My Open Source Experience podcast Gregory Kurtzer and Kelsey Hightower share their experiences to dig deeper into the challenges and solutions to building a business around open source.You will learn the following:- How to evaluate if your company is ready to get involved in an open source project or open up one of their internal ones- Why it matters who owns an open source project's trademark- Why is lock out sometimes worse than lock in- How to identify the business value when relying on open source projects- How to figure out which open source project is viable to build a business around- Empty promises don't work long term Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

By definition, open source projects and communities are supposed to be accessible. And while the code is always openly available, the remaining parts of the ecosystem might be further out of reach than you would thinkIn this episode of the My Open Source Experience Podcast, Michael Dexter, Ildiko and Phil explore the open source ecosystem from two perspectives: business and accessibility. Businesses rely on open source software, soemtimes unknowinlgy, all around the globe as digital infrastructure doesn't exist without it any more, and yet, making it integral part of the business strategy is a constant struggle for companies. And yet, even when companies and individuals reach the point of investing their time, money and resources into open source projects it appears to be more difficult than it is supposed to be. Michael, Ildiko and Phil are discussing these challenges and digging into how to address them.Learn more about:- The relationship between open source and business interests- The fragility of funding in the open source ecosystem- The role of open source foundations- Stages of involvement in open source projects- Maintainer shortage and how to bring people (back) into open source projects Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When people get introduced to open source later in their life and career it can be a bigger adjustment that is hard to do, and that's when individuals start to struggle. When you introduce open source in a large organization, the effect multiples very quickly.This My Open Source Experience podcast episode is diving into the stories and effects of getting introduced to open source in different stages of people's lives and in various circumstances:- Samson Goddy talks about his experience with open source as a kid, and * How the Sugar Desktop environment was instrumental in him gravitating to technology and communities * Why kids need a hands-on experience with how technology works rather than access to tablets and smartphones that just work- Clare Dillon shares her work with academic institutions as well as InnerSource Commons. Learn about * Why it is crucial for university students to get in touch with open source * How universities work on adding open source to the curriculum and research activities * Methods to successful and less painful change management * The SCARF Model- Federico Gonzalez Waite talks about his experience at the Mexican government as he participated in rolling out open source, and help agencies to build their own tools and solutions. Learn about: * How to navigate change through a large organization * The impact that open source had in Mexico as well as in the Latin America region Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As humanity progresses, our dependency on digital infrastructure is growing and is now at a level where most of us cannot exist without it, it is part of our everyday life and our livelihood depends on it. Open Source is a fundamental building block, and yet, awareness and opportunities still seem to gravitate towards a few geographical regions.In this episode of the My Open Source Experience podcast, Ildiko and Phil are chatting with Samson Goddy.Samson got in touch with technology through a hands-on experience with the Sugar desktop environment, which turned out to be instrumental to his relationship with tech as well as Open Source communities. His motivation to work on tech has always been to solve challenges and help people who have been close to him, and over the years he transitioned into roles, like developer relations, that are focused more on the people.Throughout his career Samson had to face that job opportunities, especially to work on Open Source, were much more accessible in the US and somewhat in Europe, which is challenging if you don't want to move continents. Driven by this experience he became one of the co-founders of Open Source Community Africa (OSCA). On the podcast we talked about Samson's first open source experiences as a kid and how he has been building and navigating a career path in Open Source since, along with OSCA and its regional impact. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When people talk about open source and government in the same sentence, it is most often about legislations, regulations and some kind of complaint along these lines. Some governments are still learning about the concept, while others decided to just jump right in.In this My Open Source Experience podcast episode Federico Gonzalez Waite talks about his years working for the Mexican government, which included introducing open source technologies and growing the adoption of open source both within government agencies, as well as around the country.Federico highlights some of the learnings and milestones of his journey:- Open source isn't just for engineers- A contract with a vendor should never keep you from exploring other options, including open source- Legislations can be in favor of open source as opposed to limiting it- Open source software and commercial solutions can co-exist, you don't have to choose one or the other- How to approach cost calculations when considering to adopt open source, and don't be surprised when the numbers come out much cheaper- Challenges with introducing new solutions, open source or not, are usually not about technology but the people, and change management- Vendors who are deeply embedded into a customer's systems can start controling technology choices and solutions, not always in the customer's favor. Government agancies are no exception Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Getting involved and investing time and resources into upstream projects can be a complicated decision and process for individuals and companies alike. Have you experienced this already?In this episode of the MOSE podcast, Kelsey Hightower talks about his open source journey, and shares tips and tricks to ensure a successful and sustainable engagement in the ecosystem. He has a versatile background, as he's been an enterprenour, a full-time employee, and creator and contributor of open source projects. He's always been driven to learn, including new tech just as much as building fundamental knowledge, and this approach became key to be successful at his work in companies and communities.Kelsey shares some of the key findings he's had throughout his career:- Incentives to invest in upstream work, both in personl and corporate context- Temporary checkpoint concept- How to make the right decision in a given moment, and then re-evaluate it- Transparency and clear communication Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ildiko and Phil kick off 2025 in this My Open Source Experience podcast episode!Learn more about:- The Cyber Resiliency Act (CRA), a new EU legislation affecting the open source ecosystem, that landed in 2024- The newly released 1.0 version of the Open Source AI Definition (OSAID)- Open-source-focused conferences to add to your schedule in 2025- A sneak peek into the rest of Season 2 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If you do open source right, you get a lot of benefits, both as an individual and as a company or orgnization. On the other hand, misconceptions about open source often lead to bad decisions, where everyone in the ecosystem suffers.Hear from experienced members of the ecosystem who you need to get involved, what to look out for, and how to approach your involvement the right way!In this episode:Amanda Brock lists some of the biggest benefits of getting involved in open source as an individual, such as access to knowledge and new information first hand.Wayne Starr has been working on oepn source projects as part of his job for years. He shares his experience with different configurations to allocate his time to upstream work, which has been ranging from 100% all the way down to 20%.Clare Dillon shares a story to highlight how budget allocations can discourage teams within companies from collaborating, and how to approach this challenge when it arises.Stephen Walli explains the challenges the open source ecosystem is facing when approaching to secure the software supply chain, and examples to efforts to address them.Gregory Kurtzer introduces Open Enterprise Linux Association (OpenELA), and talks about the importance of having non-profit organizations to protect open source software and communities. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Governments around the globe have been recognizing that open source code is a core dependency in every modern software solution. Whether or not it is a good thing that is still a question. But one thing is for sure, if you are involved in an open source project or selling a product or service that depends on one, this will affect you!In the commercial world, when something goes wrong with a product or service that a company provides, the company is liable for damages. So, what happens when a solution that contains open source code fails? And especially, what happens if the bug or vulnerability was introduced by the open source component? Who is liable? Is it the developer? Is it the open source community? Is it the company who used the code? Or?In this episode of the My Open Source Experience Podcast, Ildiko and Phil are chatting with Amanda Brock. Before becoming the CEO of OpenUK, Amanda used to be a lawyer. With that background, it is no surprise that she keeps a close eye on the legislations and regulations that governments have been creating around open source. The group talks about this ongoing work, and how this affects people and companies in the ecosystem.In this episode, you'll learn more about topics, such as:- CRA (Cyber Resiliency Act)- PLD (Product Liability Directive)- The challenges with some of the current regulations and what to look out forIt is crucial to help government officials and regulators understand the methods, processes and dynamics of open source communities and overall ecosystem. Everyone who's part of this ecosystem plays a role in educating those who don't have the expertise and the experience, including YOU!Amanda's books: https://amandabrock.com/books/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of the My Open Source Experience podcast, Gregory Kurtzer shares his experience in creating and guiding multiple open source Linux operating system projects.Have you ever wondered why there are multiple Linux distro projects in the open source ecosystem? What goes into creating a distro once you have access to the kernel? Gregory shares his experience creating multiple projects, and shares how the motivation and process were different every time.Also, have you thought about what would've happened if Linus Torvalds had went on to work for a corporate organization as opposed to the Linux Foundation? Well, for a little while he did, and that caused a big disruption in the ecosystem, open source and commercial alike. This example shows very well why you cannot leave the control in other companies' and individuals' hands, when you have hard dependencies on open source projects, and also gives you a hint why single-vendor projects are significant risk factors.Learn more about why and how community has been key to the success and longevity of the Linux kernel and operating systems to reach the popularity and significance they have today, why non-code contributions are crucial to the sustainability of the ecosystem, why your open source project needs marketing and ecosystem development, and more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We can establish that if you are using any (semi-)modern digital infrastructure or applications, then you are depending on open source software. Have you ever thought about that as actual dependency? Considering that you are not neglecting the building blocks of the software solutions that you are creating and selling, why do you do that with your open source dependencies?Learn more about why you have to invest in open source projects and how to decide what level of involvement you should have in each from Stephen Walli.Find out what drives companies to open source projects that started out as InnerSource, without the intention to open them up to the world later, and what happens when you don't let your developers work on open source projects anymore from Clare Dillon.Learn how to explain open source involvement to people who are fearful and sceptical about it from Wayne Starr. And listen to Wayne and Stephen to talk about how they and their companies are using SBOMs, and why you need to think more about using those for packages that you need to build, or hardware, before you apply the concept. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Have you ever wished your company was moving faster with developing new solutions? Or, that maintaining software wasn't such a huge burden?In this My Open Source Experience podcast episode Ildiko and Phil are talking to Wayne Starr. Wayne shares his experiences, related to open source throughout his career up until today. From discovering FOSS as a kid, through working for the U.S. Air Force to joining Defense Unicorns for the specific reason of working on open source software full time, which has been allowing him and his company to move faster, produce more reliable solutions and share knowledge more efficiently, all at the same time.Using open source software is a great first step, but to gain all the benefits, one has to invest and get involved in the projects. Wayne shares tips and tricks on- how to advocate within your company for investing in and contributing to open source projects,- what to do when you face greater resistance than what you think you can handle- how to build and advocate for an open source projectand more! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.