OPEN WORLD FORUM 2008: OPEN SOURCE APPLICATIONS WILL DRIVE THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION

Focusing for the first time on what the future holds for Open Source in 2020, the Open World Forum has highlighted the influence that Open Source will have on the implementation of tomorrow’s major technological advances. The Forum’s prediction is that Open Source applications will represent one of the main avenues for growth in our economies, and has singled out 7 predictions and 8 key recommendations.  

Paris, Open World Forum, 5 December 2008 – with 160 participants from 20 countries, and a 1,200-strong international audience, the Open World Forum in Paris brought together professionals and experts from the Open Source Software arena. Currently undergoing strong growth, this sector is at the heart of the digital revolution, and is likely to represent 30% of investment in software and IT services by the year 2012 – in other words, the equivalent of 2% of GDP for most countries. 

A world first, the Open World Forum provided a unique opportunity to assess the challenges to come, and to explore the future of Open Source – often also known as FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open Source Software) as a driver for the IT industry: one of the main engines for growth (along with ‘green’ industries) for the economy. 

AN UNPRECEDENTED STRATEGIC THOUGHT-PIECE: THE 2020 ROADMAP FOR OPEN SOURCE 

Over several months now, international representatives of all those involved in Open Source (businesses, research bodies, public sector organizations, software publishers and systems integrators, communities…) have been sharing their visions of the future and their forecasts and predictions of future scenarios, and formulating their recommendations. The results of this highly collaborative and open process were announced and published during the forum.  

The result of this exercise, the 2020 FLOSS Roadmap, emphasizes the vital importance and influence of Open Source in implementing tomorrow’s major technological advances such as Cloud Computing, Green Computing, the ‘Internet of objects’, virtual organizations, heightened reality, and mobile robots.   

2008 also emerges as a milestone year for change: the environmental crisis and systemic financial problems the world is currently experiencing  mean the future is full of uncertainty. But FLOSS applications are gaining in stature and becoming a formidable opportunity and a driver for change, a catalyst when it comes to adapting practices in industry and opening up the way to new markets. 

The 2020 FLOSS Roadmap also offers 7 key predictions:

• Prediction 1: Open Source applications will help to reduce the digital divide. The characteristics of Open Source (a common asset, sharing and mutual contributions) open the way to a more equitable digital world.    
• Prediction 2: Open Source software will become more mainstream, in everything from infrastructure to applications. They will become dominant as a standard for some segments of the software industry, and their development models will be widely adopted by suppliers of IT solutions and users alike. 
• Prediction 3: Open Source communities will facilitate the emergence of a new generation of business ecosystems. These kinds of hybrid ecosystems will enable business ecosystems based on open models and mixed open/proprietary models to emerge. Software forges will also become dominant not only as the key environment for developers, but also as veritable market places.
• Prediction 4: Cloud Computing will become more widespread. Social networks will also become prevalent as one of the main means of interaction and communication: not only for individuals, but also for business transactions and exchanges with public sector organizations. Nevertheless, although mobile devices, ambient computing, and intelligent objects are all converging around Cloud Computing, only Open Cloud services will be capable of providing adequate control of data.
• Prediction 5: Open Source software will help information technology to become the champion of environmental responsibility. With increasingly energy-efficient networks and data centers, Green Computing and environmentally responsible Cloud Computing will open up the way to new services and economic models having a low impact on the environment: anticipating the next industrial revolution.
• Prediction 6: Open Source and FLOSS will be a strategic tool for enterprise 3.0: in other words, open and collaborative businesses. Tomorrow’s IT Directors will have developed a heightened awareness of the risks of lock-in, and will consider Open Source applications as a guarantee against exploitation by suppliers. 
• Prediction 7: 40% of jobs in the information technology sector will be linked to Open Source applications. Annual growth in employment of 2% could, in this sector, lead to the creation of 1.5 million jobs in Europe, of which 1.2 million would be completely new career opportunities. In addition, the business activities stimulated by the use of Open Source applications could lead to the creation of millions of related jobs. 

There is whole-hearted commitment to these changes: however they could be delayed, or even stopped in their tracks, particularly by a strong revival in ‘closed’ technologies, and the resulting inevitably slower adoption of open technologies.

With this in mind, the 202 FLOSS Roadmap makes 80 recommendations, of which 8 are seen as key:

• Recommendation  1: Define a stable, clear and neutral legal framework (intellectual property regime, public tender regulations, interoperability) to prevent the formation of new monopolies.
• Recommendation 2: Direct R&D effort towards Open Source to facilitate technology transfer and lower entry barriers, and so enable new players to emerge.
• Recommendation 3: Orient teaching towards Open technologies and their associated collaborative skills, to reduce the digital divide and train the highly qualified professionals needed by the future knowledge economy.  
• Recommendation 4: Create open, on-line services platforms, based on industry standards, to enable the implementation of new services (both public and commercial) and new networks, as well as the opening up of new markets.
• Recommendation 5: Ensure that open technologies are the standard when it comes to innovation and business ecosystems. On a grand scale, Open Source applications have effectively demonstrated their efficiency in terms of innovation and wealth creation (the Internet, World Wide Web, etc.). The systematic use of open standards by public sector organizations and major businesses should contribute to this. 
• Recommendation 6: Widely promote and encourage the adoption and use of Open Source applications. Governments, the public sector, but also larger enterprises must send a clear and unambiguous message in their invitations to tender and when they present their ‘best practices’.
• Recommendation 7: Encourage users to contribute, include using tax incentives to do so. Not only businesses and the public sector but also the world of research are all too often still reluctant to transfer the code they have developed. Users’ contributions to the Open Source applications they use is at the heart of what we refer to as ‘the new software ecology’.
• Recommendation 8: Stimulate interaction between Open Source software communities. National and international programs must encourage cross-fertilization between the various different communities: in addition to sharing code, it will be important to encourage the sharing of available infrastructures.  

 
FIVE MAJOR EVENTS

Apart from the 2020 FLOSS Roadmap, and the plenary session, the Open World Forum was the occasion for four major announcements and events, as well as numerous associated seminars:

• The first ever Netbook World Summit. Involving all the main players in the sector (most notably Walter Bender, founder of Sugar Labs and the ex-president of the One Laptop Per Child project), this forum provided a vital overview of this exponentially-growing market (with 10 million netbooks sold in 2008). With the diversification of the range (in terms of both screen size and power), and increasing involvement from mobile operators and the arrival of new players, IDC has announced that the sales of netbooks will reach 30 million units in 2012, in effect, a turnover of $10 billion.       
• The first ‘Open Source, Human Resources and careers’ event. This conference shed light on HR issues linked to Open Source applications: from training and recognition of skills acquired, to employers’ expectations. One of the special characteristics of Open Source is the emphasis it puts on experience rather than qualifications. In Europe, as well as in India and Brazil, getting involved in community developments is proving to be an excellent investment – one of the best ways of getting oneself recognized and of securing employment. The Forum highlighted the fact that training schemes or opportunities in Open Source are experiencing growth of nearly 30% per annum.  
• Brazil’s Open Source software strategy. Leading public and private sector figures came over from Brazil to present their policies and their experience in making Brazil a pioneer in digital development around Open Source. Brazil now sees itself as a flagship nation when it comes to Open Source, having made a clear and highly committed strategic choice to focus on Open Source.   
• The publication of an exclusive survey by Forrester, commissioned by Bull, on the impact of Open Source on businesses’ IT strategies. Carried out among 132 company directors from major European enterprises that are already using Open Source, this study reveals that between 15% and 24% of North American and European enterprises make significant use of Open Source. 22% of businesses interviewed expressed a preference for an environment that was 100% Open Source. Another conclusion this study arrived at related to strong growth in the adoption of productivity tools and Open Source business applications. As a result, Open Source now appears to be the hidden backbone of the software industry, guaranteeing reduced costs while also ensuring innovation. It opens up the way to the new generation of enterprise information technologies. 

In total, 17 seminars and associated workshops were held, enabling a global assessment of the advances made by Open Source software worldwide:

• The future of the workstation: FLOSS and Cloud computing with Sun Microsystems, Starxpert and Zarafa
• Employment and careers in FLOSS
• FLOSS and BRIC: with Brazil as Guest of Honor
• Netbook World Summit
• FLOSS and Strategy: with Afdel, Cigref, Syntec System@tic Paris Région and Cap Digital
• Qualipso-Osor Conference: the future of FLOSS for enterprises
• OW2 TechDay: implementing an agile IT infrastructure
• PHP conference: deploying PHP in the enterprise, with AlterWay.
• OpenDay: an overall view of the best open solutions for the SME: business intelligence, ERP, GED, CRM…
• Gaining the benefits of FLOSS in embedded systems
• GuideShare Session
• Nuxeo: constructing an international level ECM platform  
• ERP5 world forum
• Embedded software systems
• FLOSS and Security session: the Open Source IT Security curve, with Wallix
• Education: Free software and content for education 
• Higher education: Towards a Free and Open Source curriculum for IT students. 

OPEN WORLD FORUM 2009: THE SECOND EVENT IS ALREADY SCHEDULED 

In view of the success of the event, the organizers have announced that the 2009 Open World Forum will be held in Paris on 15 and 16 October 2009. 

Find out more about the Open World Forum : http://www.openworldforum.org
Download the 2020 FLOSS Roadmap:
http://www.openworldobservatory.org/

ABOUT THE OPEN WORLD FORUM 

Created by a group of Open Software communities and major players from the IT industry, the Open World Forum set itself the objective of bringing together the main players in Open Source so they could share their ideas and projects to stimulate innovation and competitiveness in and through open applications. 

Numerous international experts from the world of FLOSS took part in this event, in the role of committee members, participants and partners.   

In particular, the Forum brought together:

• Many of the main international IT players (Accenture, Alcatel-Lucent, AtosOrigin, Bull, CapGemini, Engineering, Google, IBM, HP, SAP, Serpro, Siemens, Sun, Telefonica, Thales...)
• The main communities (Apache Software Foundation, Eclipse Foundation, FOSSFA, QualiPSo Consortium, Linux Foundation, Linux Verband, Mozilla Foundation, OSOR.EU, OW2 Consortium, Plone Foundation, Spring...) ;
• Research centers and competitiveness clusters (Cap Digital, Carnegie Mellon Silicon Valley, INRIA, Fraunhofer FOKUS, Université VII, PSNC, South China University of Technology, State University of Sao Paulo, System@tic, University of Bozen, University of Insubria, University Rey Juan Carlos, Unu Merit) ;
• A large network of SMEs from four continents (Altic, AlterWay, European Dynamics, Elastic Grid, eXo, Ingres, Mandriva, Nexedi, Nuxeo, Ohloh, OpenLogic, OpenWide, Pilot Systems, O'Engine, WALLIX... among dozens of others).

The Open World Forum is led by a steering committee including two global consortia (QualiPSo and OW2), several associations (Adullact, AFUL, April, Silicon Sentier) and two French competitiveness clusters (Cap Digital and System@tic Paris Region).

The Forum is organized by ITEMS International, with the support of the QualiPSo consortium. It also benefits from the support of numerous French, Brazilian and European public sector institutions.

Press officer/contact:
ITEMS
Sébastien Le Bail
Tel: +33 (0)1 49 85 03 26
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