It's nice to read what open-source vendors think of open source: it's easy, cheap, and quite possibly the cure for cancer. (That last one is my personal hope.) However, it's much more useful to get real customer feedback on open source. That's what makes Mercian Labels' shift to open source--with all the benefits and negatives that come with such a move--so intriguing.

Keith Curtis has just written a book about the future of software.
Enterprise Computing. That in itself isn’t unique. More unusual is that Mr. Curtis, an 11-year veteran of Microsoft, the world’s largest software company, believes deeply that open source is the future of software.

This week, the covers were lifted on North Bridge Venture Partner’s annual Future of Open Source survey. The results present a clear picture where pundits expect open source to make huge inroads as well as where proprietary software is likely to retain dominance. Other interesting insights came up. Here’s what the future of open source looks like.

Black Duck Software released a list of the top 10 projects launched in 2008 that have the most promising future in the open source community. The company also says if you're trying to decide which FOSS horse to back in the next year or so, you should put your money on mobile apps.

Digium and Fonality are two of the best-known channel brands in the IP PBX software market. But they rarely see eye to eye — especially when it comes to claims about giving back to the open source Asterisk community. In his personal blog, Fonality CEO Chris Lyman (pictured) offers his stance on giving back to Asterisk. The VAR Guy enjoys vendor showdowns. And this certainly qualifies.

An IT research company made the prediction that by the year 2012, more than 3/4 of all software will be open source. Due to the ease with which open source software is developed and the rise in programmers and Internet communities, proprietary software will quickly dissipate.

The Icelandic government has released a policy on free and open source software. In short, the policy states that when buying software free and open source software should be considered on an equal footing with proprietary software, that software based on open standards shall be chosen, that lock-ins to specific vendors should be avoided (choosing free software is one means to achieve this), that bespoke or customized software shall be reusable (and free and open source software achieves this), and finally that students of Icelandic educational institutes shall have the opportunity to learn about and use free and open source software on a par with proprietary software.

This policy applies to all state institutions and organizations operated with public funds.

I am now realizing that the future of open source software looks much different than I first expected. Proprietary software will be quietly built on open source software

The journey of software from an original, open source/hardware movement to a closed-shop, licensed world and back to open source is now complete and for many businesses open source is a viable and more flexible alternative,