socio-political and economical twist to open source

Personal view: Open source may be next business revolution reviews the new book "The Success of Open Source" by Stevens Weber, a professor of political science at the University of California at Berkeley.

Have not read this book yet, but it seems like interesting reading from this article. Here are some excerpts:

"His claim, and it's a bold one, is that this isn't just a good way of developing software, it's a new way of organising businesses. Open-source software breaks the links between developing a product and owning a product, which is the way business has traditionally organised itself. That could have startling consequences.
It's rare to find a professor of politics discussing software. "People in academic subjects are very conservative about their disciplines," Weber says. "So people are intrigued, but also a little bit nervous about an approach like this."

"Think back to the invention of the steam engine. By the standards of the time, building a railway was so complicated and so costly that none of the existing organisational forms could handle it. So the joint-stock company and the stock exchange rose to prominence. Something similar may be happening now."