To promote and protect open source software and communities...

For over 20 years the Open Source Initiative (OSI) has worked to raise awareness and adoption of open source software, and build bridges between open source communities of practice. As a global non-profit, the OSI champions software freedom in society through education, collaboration, and infrastructure, stewarding the Open Source Definition (OSD), and preventing abuse of the ideals and ethos inherent to the open source movement.

Open source software is made by many people and distributed under an OSD-compliant license which grants all the rights to use, study, change, and share the software in modified and unmodified form. Software freedom is essential to enabling community development of open source software.

News

Powering Potential Expands to Peru

Submitted by administrator on Tue, 2019-04-09 13:18

The Open Source Initiative’s first African Affiliate, Powering Potential Inc. (PPI), is pleased to announce a pilot program expansion in Peru of their award-winning solar-powered Raspberry Pi computer labs already enhancing education throughout rural Tanzania, Africa. PPI’s pilot project is placing a computing lab at the San Francisco Rio Itaya School, located in the Amazon region of Iquitos, Peru.

ClearlyDefined Update

Submitted by csmith on Tue, 2019-04-02 06:13

It’s been just over a year since the Open Source Initiative approved the proposal for ClearlyDefined to be a project under its organization. So far the project has successfully built a robust software system in collaboration with lots of folks from the community. We wanted to tell you more about what we’ve built so far and how you can get involved with the project.

March 2019 License-Review Summary

Submitted by LAtkinson on Mon, 2019-04-01 04:46

In March, the License-Review mailing list saw the retraction of the SSPL from review, and discussed a set of GPLv3 Additional Terms.

The License-Discuss list (summarized at https://opensource.org/LicenseDiscuss032019) was far more active. Among other things, it discussed Van Lindberg's upcoming Cryptographic Autonomy License, and saw extensive discussion about the license review process: whether the conduct of the list is appropriate, whether there might be alternatives to using email, and whether PEP-style summaries would help.

March 2019 License-Discuss Summary

Submitted by LAtkinson on Mon, 2019-04-01 04:46

In March, the License-Discuss mailing list discussed:

  • the Cryptographic Autonomy License
    • its interactions with the GDPR
    • how public performance applies to software
  • the License-Review process
    • views on tone and conduct on the list
    • the list's role in the license review process
    • problems with email, and alternative tools
    • whether a PEP-style process might help
  • whether licenses should be drafted without legal assistance
  • and more

Run-off Election Results

Submitted by masson on Mon, 2019-03-25 07:52

After a tie in the 2019 OSI Board of Directors election between Christine Hall, and Mariatta Wijaya, a run-off election was required. The run-off election ran from March 18th, through March 25th, 2019, resulting in a victory for Christine Hall, by a slim margin of only two votes.

Christine Hall, 96
Mariatta Wijaya, 94

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