Open Source is not the same as free

Posted by Steve Hull on Friday 16 July 2010 at 7:41am
Tags: copyright | open source | software |

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Open Source means that the actual code of the software is publicly and freely available. This means that anyone is free to modify the code and hence the workings of the software. As a result, open source software is usually, though not always, maintained by a (possibly quite large) group of volunteers. Even when the software is maintained by a private company (e.g. Moodle), the fact that it is open source means that suggestions and modifications can be made by anyone, and these changes may be incorporated into the official versions of the software by the maintaining company.

Open source software is often free as well, and when it is not free, the cost is generally very low. It should also be noted that open source software is not in the public domain, i.e. unlicensed. Rather, open source software is available under a licence (such as the GNU General Public Licence) which generally prevents users from incorporating it into proprietary products.

There are two important strengths to open source software. The first is that, since the creators/maintainers have no vested interest in keeping their code proprietary, decisions about the software are made solely to improve the software and not to protect its confidential nature. For example, a large corporation that makes a word processing package will change its file format frequently, either to make it difficult for its competitors to keep their products compatible with it or to require users to pay for new versions. Maintainers of an open source word processing package have no such motivation and hence changes made to the software will be done purely to improve the software.

The second strength is that it is unlikely that the software will ever cease to be supported. When a piece of software is proprietary to a private company, it may at any time decide to stop supporting the software at which point bugs will cease to be fixed and improvements to be made. With open source software, as long as there are programmers who are interested in maintaining the software there will be support for it. In fact, some software companies have made their products open source upon ceasing to provide support for them in order that such continuing support can flourish.

Sometimes free open source software will be sold by companies who add features such as ease of installation and technical support; a popular example of this is the versions of Linux sold by Red Hat. Linux is itself both free and open source.

A typical example of open source which is not free is Transana qualitative analysis software for video and audio data.

Free software, on the other hand, is software which does not cost anything to acquire or use. Often, but not always, free software will consist of cut-down or demonstration versions of purchasable software. Such free software will serve either to generate goodwill in the prospective buyer or to advertise the purchasable version.

A popular example of free software which is not open source is the AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition, which has had tens of millions of downloads since its inception. Perhaps the most famous example of free software which is open source is the Linux operating system (although Linux is sold by companies which provide additional services with it, the OS itself is free).

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