Sat 30 Dec 2006
I’ve just emailed an article for Zadok to consider publishing in their next edition, which will focus on technology in everyday life. The title of the article is Religion 2.0: Heralding a new wave in online religion. Not an academic paper, so no references and more general ranting than focusing on a point. It’s a whole of lot random thoughts with relatively little substance, as I’m yet to do a lot of analysis and interviews, but the general questions is explored: As the Internet moves from Oldweb to Web 2.0, will Chrsitianity also move to a more user-friendly religion? It’s here if you want a gander.
December 31st, 2006 at 05:52
Nice, snappy article that captures much of the basics. Reads well, and serves as a good introduction.
My only quibble is the definition of “open-source”. Certainly there is a reaction to poor software quality and unresponsiveness, but I think stronger (original?) motivations are the sense that access to information should be free and a communtarian ethic. Possibly that links more explicitly with the previous factor you mention.
And you can charge for open-source software, but if you’re using a “open-source” licence (e.g. GPL), then you often have to supply access to the source code along with the commercial software. E.g. you can buy a Linux distribution and one of the disks (or a part of a web site) will contain the source (at least for the base operating system).
December 31st, 2006 at 10:43
Well there’s a sentence I left out. Yes, I agree that open source was more driven by the desire for good than the dissatisfaction of bad. It was something I wanted to make more clear. If I get the chance to edit it before publication I’ll use your suggestion. Thanks, Stephen.
Glad you liked it.