.png)
Discussion around the influence of open-source software is gaining renewed attention with the latest wave of open-source AI. Along with the obvious advantages in the form of free access to the innovations there are growing concerns on the security issues. In this post, we are trying to follow the development of open-source software, its benefits for the companies and economy and of course about the risks.
To understand the very essence of open-source software, it is worth turning to the period when this idea originated. Economist Josh Lerner and Nobel Prize Laureate Jean Tirole followed the open source history in their paper The Simple Economics of Open Source. Spreading open-source software was an essential process that happened in “academic settings such as Berkeley and MIT during the 1960s and 1970s, as well as in central corporate research facilities where researchers had a great deal of autonomy (such as Bell Labs and Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center).” As authors added, in these years, “the sharing by programmers in different organizations of basic operating code of computer programs—the source code—was commonplace.” There is a bright and clear explanation in Lerner’s and Tirole’s paper, “programmers write source code using languages such as Basic, C, and Java. By way of contrast, most commercial software vendors only provide users with object, or binary, code. This is the sequence of 0s and 1s that directly communicates with the computer, but which is difficult for programmers to interpret or modify. When the source code is made available to other firms by commercial developers, it is typically licensed under very restrictive conditions.”
Source: Google
Most open-source software reviews usually mention more popular and modern examples such as Linux, Mozilla Firefox, Android. If it is more specialized media you may find Apache HTTP Server as an example. Lerner and Tirole also remembered the Apache’s development, which began in 1994. Brian Behlendorf, then 21, “had the responsibility for operating one of the first commercial Internet servers in the country, powering Wired magazine’s HotWired website. This server, like most others in the US, was at the time running the Unix-based software written at the National Center for Supercomputer Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois. (The only competitive product at the time was the server developed at the joint European particle physics research facility CERN.) The NCSA had distributed its source code freely and had a development group actively involved in refining the code in consultation with the pioneering users. As Behlendorf and other users wrote emendations, or “patches,” for the NCSA server, they would post them as well to mailing lists of individuals interested in Internet technology.”
So one of the main characteristics of open-source software is not only the free of cost but also such projects as usual have a strong community, which not only use the software but also develop it and share forward. The question about altruism is still open. The corporations are also beneficiaries of this process. Last scandal between WordPress and WP Engine illustrates what happens if there is a mess of altruism and business. As TechCrunch adds, WordPress technology is open source and free, and it powers a huge chunk of the internet — around 40% of websites. WP Engine is a hosting service specifically designed for websites that use WordPress. WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg criticized WP Engine for disabling the ability for users to see and track the revision history for every post. Mullenweg believes this feature is at the “core of the user promise of protecting your data” and said that WP Engine turns it off by default to save money. “What matters most is not openness but predictability”, the FT column on the topic suggests. FT also summarized the effect of the scandal, “Mullenweg, who also owns a for-profit web-hosting service called Automattic, seems to be freezing a rival out of a resource that was previously open to all. While the nominal cause is a trademark dispute, the effect is that the rules governing WordPress are suddenly fuzzy.”
Experts from DigitalOcean write about advantages of leveraging open-source AI. They define open-source AI as a powerful force in driving innovation and accessibility across various fields. Here is a summary of the main benefits, as outlined by DigitalOcean:
1. Diverse Use Cases: Open-source AI platforms offer a wide range of practical applications, including real-time fraud detection, medical image analysis, personalized recommendations, and customized learning experiences.
2. Accessibility: Open-source AI projects and models are easily accessible to developers, researchers, and organizations, which promotes widespread adoption and utilization.
3. Community Engagement: By leveraging open-source AI, organizations can tap into a diverse community of developers who continuously contribute to enhancing and advancing AI tools.
4. Transparency and Iterative Improvement: The collaborative aspect of open-source AI promotes transparency and facilitates ongoing improvements, resulting in the creation of feature-rich, reliable, and modular tools.
5. Vendor Neutrality: Open-source AI solutions allow organizations to avoid being tied to any specific vendor, providing them with flexibility and independence in their technology choices.
Source: Red Hat, Inc.
The use of open-source models in businesses is actually on the rise. Red Hat’s 2022 report ‘The State of Enterprise Open Source’ suggests that 80% of IT leaders expect to increase their use of enterprise open-source software and 89% believe open source is as or more secure than its alternative. Grammarly CEO Rahul Roy-Chowdhury presents these statistics in a column for weforum.org. Writing about the AI regulatory Rahul Roy-Chowdhury also mentions the open-source software. “For context, closed-source models are maintained by an organization and their code is not made publicly available for use or audit. Open-source models, such as Falcon LLM and Llama2 are free for the public to use and modify in the name of innovation,” the post explains. “Some people may have concerns that bad actors can intentionally change the code of an open-source model, leading to security issues.”
Source: Global Market Insights
In 2023, IDC research reported a 241% increase in software supply chain attacks, with 64% of organizations impacted by a vulnerability or compromise associated with open-source software. With regard to application security, two main gaps were identified in the Tidelift material on the report:
the growing use of open-source software
vulnerable software supply chains
Marcel Scholze, Director Open Source Software Services & IT Sourcing, PwC Germany, points out that “security gaps – for example due to outdated components, missing identification and response mechanisms, unclear provenance or non-transparent dependencies – can lead to exclusion in procurement processes, loss of reputation or massive legal and financial consequences in the B2B environment.” But there is another point of view. In HP review ‘security’ is among advantages of open-source software: “the more eyes that review a source code, the fewer security vulnerabilities. However, open-source software isn’t immune to loopholes and bugs.”
Global Market Insights valued the open-source services market at USD 30.2 billion in 2023, with a projected compound annual growth rate (CAGR) exceeding 16% from 2024 to 2032. This growth is being driven by the rapid adoption of cloud computing. Cloud platforms offer an ideal infrastructure for running open-source applications, making deployment easier and reducing the need for expensive hardware and licensing fees.
As companies increasingly adopt open-source solutions to enhance their IT infrastructure and drive digital innovation, the accessibility of these platforms along with a tech-savvy global population positions open-source services for substantial growth. However, while factors such as cost efficiency, enhanced security, and quality improvements are propelling this market forward, a critical question remains: Can open-source technologies continue to evolve freely, or will commercial and regulatory constraints ultimately limit their openness?
