The OSS Watch and OpenSpires Projects Rowan Wilson, Legal and Research Officer

Part of the HEA/JISC-funded Open Educational Resources Programme Two main objectives: –Release audio and video podcasts as OER (open content) –Investigate and disseminate the institutional implication of OER release

Our approach Built on the success of podcasts.ox.ac.uk and iTunesU; widespread participation providing a pool of academics to approach Inhabit an existing content production workflow (iTunesU) and adapted it to make OER release a low-effort option (including IPR process) Encouraged devolved model of content production but supported the majority of recordings from the podcasting service

Achievements so far… 8 lecture series (around hours) 30+ sets of other resources (including seminars, interviews, conference presentations and panel discussions). Over 180 media items are currently available as open content through Over 100 Oxford academics and visiting have signed the OpenSpires (Creative Commons) licence Subject areas already covered include politics, economics, environmental change, business, research ethics, medicine, physics, English, classics, art history, philosophy....

OSS Watch : Founded in 2003 in response to JISC call Drafted the JISC’s Open Source Policy Two successful subsequent bids Uniquely, we are non-advocacy

“OSS Watch provides unbiased advice and guidance on the use, development, and licensing of free and open source software. OSS Watch is funded by the JISC and its services are available free-of-charge to UK higher and further education. If you want to find out more about open source software, we're the people to ask. OSS Watch is an advisory service so we can help your project build an open development community but we cannot write your code for you.”

We provide: Quality-assured reusable (CC BY-SA) content on FOSS topics ( Free consultancy on open development, community building, software licensing and FOSS procurement to HE and FE sectors Events (Transfer Summit, Keble College, Oxford, June) Strategic projects

What is Free and Open Source Software? Software that the user has the right to adapt and distribute Access to the source code Often available at minimal or no cost Permits commercial reuse Often maintained and developed by a community Increasingly high public profile and market share (Linux, Apache httpd, Firefox, OpenOffice.org, Xensource) Basis of later open content licences like Creative Commons

What’s the connection? Ethically-motivated beginnings –FOSS had principles of education and individual freedom at its root –A response to perceived enclosure of intellectual commons General licensing models –An offer open to all –No explicit agreement necessary The centrality of community –Pooling of resources to benefit and educate

How do they compare? Open content is less than ten years old OER efforts are less than 3 years old FOSS is between years old (albeit with a definite growth spurt in the last 12)

How do they compare? Ethically-motivated beginnings –FOSS has developed beyond purely ethically-driven agenda into a compelling and pragmatic model for software development General licensing models –FOSS community has always rejected limitations on commercial use –FOSS licences have proliferated wildly The centrality of community –FOSS projects have sited themselves somewhere between two approaches to community: broadcast or collaborate

The Broadcast Model Closed process of development ‘Owned’ by a single institution or closed consortium ‘Throwing it over the wall’ when it’s done Many academic projects take this approach External contributions are generally not expected (and are perhaps unwelcome) Large and successful FOSS projects like OpenOffice also use this model This model is used by most OER projects, including ours

The Collaborate Model Public discussion of development roadmap Project often sits outside contributor organisations, perhaps in a NFP or charitable foundation Releases are built in public External contributions are encouraged Large and successful FOSS projects like Apache httpd use this model OSS Watch favours this approach for software projects for sustainability reasons

Sustainability benefits of the Collaborate model for software Project history is public, design decisions documented ‘Under the bus’ factor greatly reduced External bodies wanting to commit effort or funding have a convenient was of assessing the public impact of the project’s work up to that point

Possible benefits of the Collaborate model for OER Reuse can be easier to track Duplication of effort can be reduced For well-known projects rewards and recognition for contributors is generated automatically by association, with contributions publicly trackable Projects both generate useful material and teach collaborative working methods

However… Collaboration requires additional effort –OSS Watch strategic projects IP rights must be handled in a disciplined way Project processes must be documented and stuck to –Design decision-making process –How contributions are made –How disagreements are settled Perhaps software is different –Easier to identify and agree on quality criteria? Perhaps teachers are just different…

“ Egocentrism Related to the previously topic, is reuse by authors, as opposed to nonauthors, so extensive simply because they know what exists in their own content, or is there a bias to use one’s own work (i.e., a “not-created-here” attitude even among those who extol the virtue of reuse)? The fact that a person is creating a collection within an OER repository might indicate a greater willingness to use someone else’s creation, but it certainly is not guaranteed. It is possible that the person using an OER is motivated by the free hosting of content or the proliferation possibilities for their own content.” Sean Duncan, "Patterns of Learning Object Reuse in the Connexions Repository," Connexions, June 2, 2009,

In conclusion Truly collaborative open development in software improves project sustainability Potentially OER projects could gain additional benefits for both their participants and sponsors if they embraced collaborative open development models Potentially ‘code is different’

More information: Thank you!