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Embracing the open source spirit of the social web
The world is changing at a very rapid pace. Creation and innovation are happening much more quickly and it’s in part due to the mainstream emergence of the open source philosophy (not just in software and web applications; other industries are adopting the model as well). People are starting to figure out that working together with transparency, in most cases, is more productive than closed-door policies. Perhaps it’s an ethical movement. Either way, a great example of this is what’s been happening online over the past few years. People are sharing their daily lives, ideas and information online in many ways. People are living open source lives and if you’re an entrepreneur, you should look to the social web to help propagate and grow your business. Embrace “the open”.
Naturally, there are going to be elements of your business that you might not want to be completely transparent about, but you’d be surprised how many things you can open up. And be sure not to think of it as a one-way street in which your business is giving away your intellectual property; you also gain a lot from the ecosystem. You assume some risk, but the benefit can far outweigh that.
Here’s a real world example to draw from: a good friend of mine is an architect and I myself have worked in interactive agencies for most of my professional career. At first glance, you might not think those two industries (architecture and web development) have much in common. However, after some conversations about project frustrations, we realized there are many similarities between the way you build a building and the way you build a website. Not just in small ways, but in fundamental ways. The difference is that architecture has been around for centuries and websites, a little under two decades. There is so much the interactive space can learn from architecture, but without being open to the idea and having a platform on which to do it, it will never happen (and this is an example of non-competing industries, which puts very low risk on both sides).
Cathy and I recently attended an informal chat over lunch with the smart folks at Torch Partnership and some other bright minds where this topic came up. The common theme was that it’s something we’ve all encountered and there was no definitive answer on an effective way to cross-pollinate different industries. It’s a fear many businesses face: a fear of opening the doors and allowing people to see in. Maybe the idea is you have one door of your business closed behind which the bread-and-butter happens, but the rest are open for daily tours (not literally of course… or maybe so).
Ilse (our CEO) is also very focused on how MaRS can help foster this “openness” using web technology. It’s more than just social networking. It’s about putting attributes to the ecosystem and finding where the commonalities are.
So part of our mission right now is to understand how MaRS can support a platform on which we can identify core problems or challenges within industries, relate them, share them, and solve them. It’s a big undertaking and there are already plenty of subject matter experts from whom we know we can learn. In true MaRS spirit, our doors are always open and if you’re interested in being part of the initiative, drop me an email and let’s connect.
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Joseph @ MaRS
Joe is the Manager of Online Development at MaRS. He finds out about all the cool web technologies out there and tries to figure out how we can use them at MaRS.
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