Open Source Technology Has Fuelled The Growth Of The Internet

Open source is an approach to the design, development, and distribution of software, offering practical accessibility to softwares source code. Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical strategic element of their operations. Before open source became widely adopted, developers and producers used a variety of phrases to describe the concept; the term open source gained popularity with the rise of the Internet, which provided access to diverse production models, communication paths, and interactive communities.
The open source model of operation and decision making allows concurrent input of different agendas, approaches and priorities, and differs from the more closed, centralized models of development. The principles and practices are commonly applied to the peer production development of source code for software that is made available for public collaboration. The result of this peer-based collaboration is usually released as open-source software; however open source methods are increasingly being applied in other fields of endeavor, such as biotechnology.
To understand best how open source technology is developed, we can compare it to traditional closed source software produced by companies such as Microsoft.
Open source software is based around the idea that the user can not only view, but change the source code of an application. Closed source software is hidden to prevent the user either viewing or changing the code.
After initial production, open source software is released to the development community and undergoes a secondary phase of evolution. It is scrutinized by thousands of professional developers across the globe who highlight potential flaws, bugs and security glitches. These suggestions and improvements are fed back to the developer who considers them for inclusion in his application. Whereas closed source software is developed in isolation with a small team of developers. It isn't possible to build a team of hundreds to check the code because the code is deemed proprietary and secret. Bugs and security flaws are often not found until after a product launch when a steady stream of security patches and updates are required.
It is open source technology that has fuelled the growth of the Internet over the last six years with key applications such as Sendmail, Linux, Apache and WebStore, languages like Java and Perl, and mark-up languages such as HTML, WML and XML.
Open Source technology makes business sense. Besides being free and of very high quality, it is often more powerful than most commercially available products. This is because its shared development harnesses the benevolent brilliance of thousands around the world who are continually developing, improving, and evolving its core. It's a worldwide community, getting together to build something awesome, regardless of distance, language, and culture.