5 reasons we said YES to the first Open Source//Open Society

For two days in April, Wellington will be home to some of the biggest influencers in open source development and open society thinking. Building on the success of open source software in powering the growth of the internet Open Source // Open Society will explore developments in open government, open innovation, open education, open data, and open business.

We couldnt miss the opportunity to get involved so are sponsoring the first ever Open Source // Open Society (OS//OS) conference on the 16th and 17th April 2015. Heres just 5 of the reasons why we jumped at supporting OS//OS:

1. We love open source!

We believe in, and have experienced firsthand, the power of an open developer community. The best way to encourage and create better software is to have people contribute back to the main code base and share their work with others.

In November 2006, we released the SilverStripe CMS as a free, open source download, followed by the SilverStripe Framework in 2012. Open sourcing our software has been a far bigger success than we could have imagined. The global interest in SilverStripe the company, and SilverStripe the product has been astounding. We have seen strong growth in adoption of our software around the globe. In addition, many of our own customers are now developing unique and novel solutions on top of SilverStripe and are integrating our software deep into their own product offerings. These projects in turn feed back into the open source project to help drive innovation further.

2. We want Wellingtons vibrant open source community to keep growing

We think Wellington is a pretty cool place to live and work! Were proud to be part of the vibrant open source community that calls Wellington home, many of whom have jumped on board as fellow sponsors. Plus being the hub for NZ government creates huge opportunities for the local open source community to create value for our society as a whole. So its fitting that the first ever Open Source // Open Society conference will take place in Wellington. OS//OS is the perfect showcase for what is possible with an open approach to coding, data and democracy and were excited to see what comes out of the two days.

3. We want to help the government open source everything!

The amount that government invests in online channels is significant DIA conservatively estimates spending at least $40 million each year. However, website developments are usually treated as a one-off project, requiring unnecessary reinvestment in design, development, procurement and security. The functional requirements of most government websites are similar, yet agencies rarely leverage investments already made in technology components, designs and contracts.

From our involvement in the Common Web Platform weve seen how open source and open data can help the public sector deliver better solutions while saving taxpayer money. Greater sharing of code by government agencies and local councils means less money wasted on code that is replicated or poorly maintained. Were hopeful that the public sector will support OS//OS and use it as an opportunity to come together to shape the future of open source in government.

The rest is here:
5 reasons we said YES to the first Open Source//Open Society