IT Business Edge: More Than One Way to Measure Usefulness

Lora Bentley writes a post on what motivates people to contribute and measure value, citing Amanda’s comments on open source developers.

“Finally, I will defer to Linux Foundation VP Amanda McPherson, who responded to my inquiry regarding Solyanik’s comment via e-mail. She said, in part: ‘The open source developers I know are also motivated by users and the usefulness of their work. They don’t just use money as the only indicator of their worth, especially since the money earned for software in this example is earned more from monopoly advantage than superior technology or true customer choice. If you’re a developer, how much more satisfying is it to know someone chose your software because they liked it and not only because it came bundled with their PC?’ Solyanik has one way of looking at it. Most open source developers have another.”