This is a proposal for a talk that I'd love to give. If you'd love to have me present this at your conference, please get in touch. If you'd like to attend this talk, please +1 it in the comments.
Versions of this talk have been presented at:
This talk is vitally important, as it explains how companies can have the developer presence and attraction of Google, and the personal brand success of people like Paul Irish if they wish. It's important that it is presented at non-open-source conferences, as that would just be preaching to the choir rather than to those web developers whom need it most.
- Why are we here?
- We realise that Open-Source is a threat to Closed-Source mindets and methodologies
- We want to learn more about open-source, to either destroy it, or embrace it
- Where possible, we want to leverage it as much as possible to get all the benefits we can out of it (personally, and company wise)
- What is Open-Source?
- A better way of thinking about it is being open, but what is being open? what is the difference?
- Being closed, the current default, secludes transparency and accessibility to those limited within a company
- Being open, the emerging default, provides transparency and accessibility to everyone, not just those within the same company
- The benefit is dramatic sharing of knowledge (INWARDS AND OUTWARDS), skills, and accessbility
- But why do Open-Source? Why does it matter?
- Story time
- I wanted a blog, got a blog, learned via open-source community, got good enough I could freelance doing open-source plugins — open-source (or rather free culture) taught me my profession and pays my bills
- Where am I now? Now sponsored by Myplanet Digital (and ocassionally others) to work on my open-source projects, travel the world, share as much knowledge as I possible can, and impact change. In 2013 I visited; Australia, India, Indonesia, Canada, and Germany.
- But it's not about the money, or the travel, or whatever. It's about helping as many people as possible, while they raise me higher too. It's the ultimate win-win. Open-source makes that possible.
- And our community, Bevry, now runs DocPad, the 19th most popular node.js website, a top 20 most popular coffeescript project, with over 500 daily users. Created History.js one of the most popular and most used javascript projects in the world, and also does Startup Hostel, InterConnect and Web Write on the side. It's not just myself, it's a community.
- So how does this apply to you?
- You and your company can leverage open-source in the same I have, to accomplish amazing things.
- Going open provides more online presence. It builds your company AND you up. Do you know Paul Irish? Or Google? Or Both? You're no longer tied to a company, you're tied to a community.
- Going open provides agility and security. You can easily leverage pieces, and swap them out — never have to worry about a company or product you use being shut down and leaving you stranded.
- Going open helps more people. The best way to share an idea, is to share it, not to keep it secret. There is never too little sharing, or too much sharing. Yes, there may be consequences, but consequences can be rectified as you learn and grow. It'snot about being prefect, it's about becoming better than you already were, together, with each other. A global company. A global community.
- Where can you go from here?
- Release videos on youtube, have open meeting were possible, have your employees talk about the things they find nifty and record them
- Release nifty generic tooling you do open-source, with a good readme, docs, and vision to get others onboard
- Earn some passive income! Inspire people to give via gittip, patreon, etc. Or even turn on youtube advertising to earn some considerable dough.
- Ask for sponsorship for your projects. Present your ideas at conferences. Blog. Don't be afraid to be a fool, I have videos of me in my pajamas for hecks sake!
- And if you want to be radical, record everything, you can always through away things that mention sensitive info, but you can't release something you didn't record. Maximise your opportunities for growth and sharing, not restrict them from carelessness.
- Questions.
+1 - I'd love to attend!