I’ve been researching and musing over how open source and business go together like two slices of bread. The contraption tastes good only if the stuff in between meshes well. Over the next few days I want to cover three main themes:

• What is Free and Open Source Software all about, where did it come from, when were the conditions right , why did it come about, and how is it relevant to open source hardware and the work going on at FeF?
• What is the current state of open source hardware, who is doing it, to what degree are they successful, and how do they differ from each other?
• Given the current state of the art in open source business models, how can it be improved on - and what is the actual business plan going to look like?

I look forward to sharing on this topic and hearing feedback.