8. Anticipatory appreciating, alongside a paradigm of governing subworlds

8.3.1 Judging material reality entails anticipatory appreciating

Judging material reality through a period of true innovating is an organizational challenge of selecting facts relevant to the current situation. A new reality tends to be cocreated psychologically anchored to the past, e.g. podcasting was first thought as a way to narrowcast radio programs, and then was as a way to replay teleconferences, but not as a way to leave voice messages to each other rather than sending email. Material effects that are tangible are frequently difficult to separate from hype, with early adopters and fanboys make noise about possibilities that may or may not be actualized. Judging occurs both amongst decision-makers who have a knowledgeable appreciation of anticipation of events over which they have some control, and by the uninformed who may jump to conclusions that are totally unfounded. "Technology is anything that was invented after you were born", says Alan Kay²⁷⁷. Generative patterns of judging material reality shown in three concerns in Table 8.1.

For judging material reality, let’s first focus on the concern of OSwPS, supported by the cases in Chapter 4.

(a) Finding room for the commercial beyond non-profit institutions is a generative pattern across and along all seven cases for the concern of OSwPS. The case of integrating development has the Eclipse technology – consortium – foundation has been success both as a non-commercial initiative, and a platform for developing software and businesses. The Eclipse platform hosted on the eclipse.org web site has continued to evolve for over a decade, with an extensible architecture whereby plug-in packages can be deployed on demand. On the non-commercial side, the Eclipse Foundation cites thousands of universities and research institutes using the platform.²⁷⁸ IBM has built commercial products for its Rational, Lotus and WebSphere brands. Other companies that have offered commercial products based on Eclipse include Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, Hitachi, and SAP.²⁷⁹ Companies that notably have not participated in Eclipse include Microsoft (with a competitive Visual Studio), Sun Microsystems (preferring the pure Java Netbeans) and Apple (with products built on Objective-C coming from the NeXT acquisition).

(a.i) For an offering leader, are customers embracing chargeable commercial extensions beyond non-chargeable platforms supported? is a driving voice on issues. Open sourcing enables everyone to copy artifacts to package an alternative offering for either commercial or non-commercial pursuits. Even free software (i.e. GNU licenses) permit sellers to charge for something obtainable for free. In the developed world, many consumers are willing to pay for bottled water while that alternative from taps doesn’t won’t cost them anything.

(a.ii) Shaping a commons as form emerges, so that commercial participation in the future is ensured is an affording value for the offering leader. While open sourcing is conventionally incorporated as an independent non-profit institution, the charter and conduct guidelines are set by the founding members. While an ongoing ability to credibly influence the commons is limited, conditions can be set so that commercial participants are at least not disadvantaged.

(a.iii) Funders see non-zero sum games where societal progress and commercial activity coevolve is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. Member activity in OSwPS can range from active contribution to passive observation. Participation on parts of commons initiatives can be dialled up or down, depending on interests at the time.

(a.iv) For governing leaders, what institutions and regulations will allow independent entrepreneurs to advance the standard-of-living within our jurisdiction? is a containing system for the pattern. The material reality of commercial and non-commercial interests working together tends to be culturally and politically based within nations. For organizations to operate internationally, enforcing copyright and licensing policies may rely on the background legal and governmental institutions.

(a.v) For an offering adopter, what is the practicality of moving between commercial and non-profit alternatives? is a contained system for the pattern. A customer of a commercial provider may or may not care that an open sourcing version is available, e.g. IBM’s WebSphere Application Server has always had Apache counterparts. Having an open sourcing alternative free of licensing restrictions is good for educational purposes, and upgrading to a private sourcing version should be easy. For a business leader, having an option to stay "within the family" can be a better position than losing a customer to a competitor who locks in.

The concern of private sourcing only (PSo) has a generative pattern inferred from behaviours around OSwPS activities.

(b) Winning with superiority over competitors is a generative pattern for PSo. Business strategy thinking is sometimes influenced by military history of combat. An offering doesn’t necessarily have to decimate the playing field, but it does need to be perceived by at least some customers to be better than those from competitors.

(b.i) For an offering owner, is a sufficient share of the market choosing our features and pricing over competitors? is a driving voice on issues. A commercial business has to generate a profit to survive. Having paying customers gives the enterprise cash flow on which resources can be deployed, or reorganized, should economics be unsatisfactory.

(b.ii) Gaining additionally on a credible market position so that the business grows with new and repeat customers is an affording value for the offering owner. Launching a new offering is hard. Word of mouth can lead to success building on success. Retaining customer has a greater return on investment than acquiring new customers.²⁸⁰

(b.iii) Advantages of intellectual property rights are granted nationally and recognized by treaties and foreign jurisdictions internationally is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. Leading companies are wary of "knock-off" and "copycat" competitors who can reproduce designs that have proven to be desirable in the marketplace. Most copyright infringement enforcements pursued in civil courts rather in criminal courts. Having legal recourse discourages imitations.

A generative pattern for the concern of open sourcing only (OSo) is similarly inferred.

(c) Sharing and caring in the commons observed is a generative pattern for the concern of OSo. The material reality of active participation across the community has to be live up to the charter promised at its formation. Individuals can be seen acting not only towards their own interest, but helping others who want to help themselves.

(c.i) For a community participant, are contributions continuing to be welcomed and considered fairly? is a driving voice on issues. After an initiative has matured, the volume of changes could slow down. A living community may choose to work on fixed tiers with irregular dates (e.g. the Debian Linux community has a stable release repository in which backports from future versions may be added, with alternatives including oldstable, testing, and unstable), or timeboxed schedules with negotiated scope (e.g. the Ubuntu Linux community has Long Term Support releases every 2 years promising 5 years of updates, and Regular releases every 6 months promising 9 months of updates). With either approach, behaviours following (or not following) processes of reviewing and promoting changes can be observed.

(c.ii) Preserving privilege perpetually to customize and/or fix any version of an offering, past, present or future so as to maintain self-determination is an affording value for a community participant. A community member should understand the conditions of his or her contribution, which doesn’t necessarily restrict personal future endeavours, but does grant rights to everyone for copying, reusing and deriving works in prespecified ways. Staying with an older release that could have been deprecated, is not an issue while do-it-yourselfers can build their own fixes.

(c.iii) Community has facilitators guiding processes to scope active releases and stabilize less popular prior works is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. Automation can reduce some effort in coordination, but ultimately collaboration amongst human beings is required to decide on future plans. Incorporated open sourcing foundations sometimes have community moderators, but the major of projects operate with committees of volunteers.

The three issues around (i) charging commercial customers, (ii) sufficient market size and (iii) community participation, incorporate concerns across open sourcing and private sourcing programs. Organizations, both commercial and non-profit, are chartered with intents and conditions that may or may not materialise in reality. Judging when or if an initiative deserves its mandate to be extended, stabilized or wound down is complicated decision amongst multiple players.

8.3.2 Judging formal value(s) entails anticipatory appreciating

Judging formal value(s) looks across the shape of adoption while innovating. Value(s) are placed on outcomes now practical that were not previously possible, as stakeholders weigh benefits versus associated consequences and costs. Formal effects in take-up or rejection across a population in scale (e.g. adoption in numbers as broadly or narrowly), in scope (e.g. adoption for uses as universal or selected) and in speed (e.g. adoption as acceptance rapidly or slowly) can challenge the viability of the initiative on both short horizon and long horizon timeframes. Judging is decentralized amongst actors who may change personal predispositions, acquiesce, or resist in preferences to prior ways. "The future has arrived — it’s just not evenly distributed yet", says William Gibson.²⁸¹ Generative patterns of judging formal value shown in three concerns in Table 8.2.

We can focus first on formal value(s) with the concern of OSo, supported by the cases in Chapter 4.

(a) Growing a bigger pie as better than a slicing a smaller pie is a generative pattern significant across and along all seven cases for the concern of OSwPS.²⁸² In the case of integrating development, the Eclipse platform originated from the Java IDE originally developed by OTI prior to its acquisition by IBM. While the technologies at hand in the late 1990s were based on personal computing (e.g. Windows XP would be released in 2001), the Java technology would enable scalability from mainframe computers down into embedded devices such as smartphones (e.g. Siemens in 2001, Nokia in 2002). Building on a virtual machine that would work on a variety of hardware platforms rather than optimizing on a single or few chips is an ambitious direction with a longer horizon.

(a.i) For an industry champion, what investments are commercially viable alongside non-chargeable works in commons? is a driving voice on issues. While all releases of an open sourcing product should be available into perpetuity, a private sourcing counterpart conventionally follows an offering life cycle of pre-release, general availability, maintenance support, upgrades, and withdrawal. Within that cycle, investments have to produce either monetary or strategic benefits over costs.

(a.ii) Expanding the popularity of an industry platform, so as to gain cofounder position and experience is an affording value for the industry champion. If an industry standard is victorious over other approaches in a marketplace, and one company can be seen hands-on to that effort, the victor generally benefits with a halo effect with customers as a winner.

(a.iii) Market opportunity is large but specifics are uncertain is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. A new-to-the-world innovation comes with value(s) that are ambiguous before becomes concreting, finding its level after a conventional wisdom emerges. A champion have a vision intuitively "the right thing to do", and adjust practicalities as the shape of the offering becomes more certain.

(a.iv) For a potential innovator, what untapped wants and needs could be fulfilled by additional offerings using our resources? is a containing system for the pattern. In a large enterprise, the overall value(s) may not be within a single initiative, but gained in a synergy across a portfolio of activities spread over a period of time.

(a.v) For an offering manager, of the addition value cocreated, how much can we capture? is a contained system for the pattern. Society at large may have benefited by cooperating amongst companies and the open source community, yet the accountability for an offering is generally placed on the shoulders of an individual. For the private sourcing to continue while open sourcing, value has to be captured for the commercial interests.

A generative pattern for the concern of PSo can be inferred from the research into OSwPS.

(b) Supplying a segment of the downward sloping demand curve is a generative pattern for the concern of PSo. Economics is generally based on scarcity, and some subset of customers who place a higher value on offering are willing to pay more than the typical party in the world at large.

(b.i) For an offering manager, what target segment of customers can we sustain with products and services? is a driving voice on issues. Appealing to a larger customer set increases revenue by decreasing price and seeking higher volume. However, more sales entail supporting more products and services, and resources of the same quality and/or availability may be limited. Profitability and revenue are related, but not directly coupled.

(b.iii) Funders willing to invest until net cash flow is positive is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. The costs to build an offering can accumulate months or years before revenue flows in. Further, cash inflows usually start small before ramping up. Funders of a new offering may be internal to an organization based on surplus generated in other businesses, or externally through venture capital or investment banking. Patience for economic sustainability is generally limited.

A generative pattern for the concern of OSo can be inferred similarly.

(c) Rising the tide to lift all boats is a generative pattern for OSo. Orienting towards action that furthers value(s) not only for oneself but for others may lead to a community of mutual support. By definition, open sourcing means that everyone should have equal access to the means of production, although the ability of individuals to capitalize will be variable.

(c.i) For a community participant, what works are worth preserving in the commons into perpetuity? is a driving voice on issues. A crisis can bring people together, and may lead to a wealth of donations as reactions. However, not all contributions have equal value, and deserve preservation. Libraries and museums establish deaccession and disposal policies in order to maintain some coherency in their collections.

(c.ii) Access to artifacts and/or original makers in the community so that experiences and reasoning is shared is an affording value for the community participant. Shared source materials removes most needs to "reinvent the wheel". Sometimes, however, deeper insight into the whys and hows leading to the commonplace are revisited for reinvention or innovation. Records of provenance in open sourcing repository eases research or historical reconstruction.

The three issues of (i) benefiting from growing a bigger pie, (ii) sustaining a profitable market segment and (iii) preserving a living commons, incorporate concerns mixed across open sourcing and private sourcing programs. The range of value(s) as either common across a large population or splintered in narrow segments can impact the viability of a mainstream or multiple niche offerings. Establishing value(s) as either positive or negative is not static either within a group or across groups, and may change through parties negotiating.

8.3.3 Judging efficient instrumentality layers into anticipatory appreciating

Judging efficient instrumentality spreads engagement in a period of innovating with participation ranging from passive to active. Instrumentality in changing a world is associated with authority and the influence to have others join in a social movement. Efficient effects from agency may be attributed to actions by a leader or champion around whom others coalesce. Judging the future impact of conscious action reveals propensity or aversion to risk, as collective activity is rarely a sure thing. "An acre of performance is worth a whole world of promise".²⁸³ Generative patterns of judging efficient instrumentality in three concerns is shown in Table 8.3.

For efficient instrumentality, the concern of OSwPS can be reviewed first, following from the cases in Chapter 4.

(a) Stratifying concierge levels above mainstream excellence is a generative pattern across and along all seven cases for the concern of OSwPS. The quality of open sourcing works can be high when "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow".²⁸⁴ A commercial offering has to have features attract to at least some paying customers, who would otherwise choose a non-chargeable alternative. The case of coauthoring shows a long history of collaborative document editing, where editors are commonly packaged with operating systems. In the era of personal computing, writers, presenters and bookkeepers paid for Microsoft Office, with no cost alternative of Star Office and then Open Office. With self-service kiosks (e.g. filling out a form at a public terminal at a bank or post office), these types of applications are difficult to maintain. Diskless workstations and then web browsers (with restricted features) replicated the features for organizations with computing security, but the export of documents eventually led to interchange standards (i.e. Open Document Format).

(a.i) For a commercial contributor, what distinctive chargeable features can we develop beyond non-chargeable contributions? is a driving voice on issues. If a commercial organization is unable to make a profit on an offering, it may orchestrate a graceful exit from the market. IBM never charged for downloads of its IBM Symphony, and eventually donated the entire codebase to the Apache Open Office project. Related private sourcing document editors have been embedded in Lotus collaboration products that continued to be profitable.

(a.ii) Offering specialized functions to higher valuing segments, so that needs with greater depth and speed are served is an affording value for the commercial contributor. While the IBM Symphony product was never chargeable, customers interested in migrating from Microsoft Office could choose to pay for support services. Adopters who don’t pay for software generally have some tolerance for defects. Business users who use software dictated by corporate standards are more demanding when they’re trying to get a job done.

(a.iii) Expertise and/or proficiency is/are on a gradient is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. Adopters of an offering are generally not equally facile with it. When a casual user prefers to rely on assistance of someone more proficient, rather than struggling through himself or herself, there’s an opportunity for performing for a fee.

(a.iv) For an actor with abilities, what build or buy options are appropriable and non-appropriable? is a containing system for the pattern. Modern civilization is full of choices on modern conveniences where we delegate some activities to others, and do some other tasks ourselves. In some cases, we embody the resources, and other others, we access them from others.

(a.v) For an offering adopter, what ongoing outcomes are better from a provider than doing it ourselves? is a contained system for the pattern. Opting for a commercial provider leads options open about when and if an adopter will switch to the open sourcing version, which may or may not have fewer features.

A generative pattern for the concern of PSo can be inferred from the research into OSwPS.

(b) Giving customers what they want is a generative pattern for PSo. A commercial organization that has acquired a customer may extend its offerings to retain the business. If the core organization doesn’t natively possess the product extensions or complementary services, they may be obtained from an ecosystem partner.

(b.i) For an offering manager, with which features are customers resonating? is a driving voice on issues. The relationship with customers can be a mystery, unless an organization makes the effort to survey for post-purchase satisfaction, and listen for cues. An offering provider can focus on distinctive features.

(b.ii) Responding to and/or anticipating customer requests so that renewing relationships are predisposed is an affording value for the offering manager. Appreciating the preferences of customers precludes defections to competitors. An ideal of knowing the customer better than he or she knows himself opens an opportunity for anticipating latent or future requests.

(b.iii) Supplier (brand) preference persists in nonperfect market is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. An offering provider has to have some control over the organization’s destiny with the customer. If products and/or services are undifferentiated, an ongoing social relationship could make the difference.

A generative pattern for the concern of OSo can be inferred similarly.

(c) Helping oneself while helping others is a generative pattern for OSo. Volunteering one’s works into the commons presumes that producing them is relatively easy, or that reciprocity in some way is expected.

(c.i) For a community participant, what am I contributing as a volunteer to the commons? is a driving voice on issues. Legitimacy in an open sourcing community is gained through participation. People contribute according to their skills. Reporting a bug or adding to documentation shows respect towards shared interests, as an alternative to contributing nothing.

(c.ii) Diagnosing and fixing issues independently and/or with community help, so personal priorities are expedited is an affording value for the community participant. In an active open sourcing community, channels of communication are generally open so that urgencies can be surfaced. If the problem has potential impact on many, persisting with collective efforts will yield progress.

(c.iii) Easy entry to, and exit from, benevolent neutral territory is a spatio-temporal frame for the pattern. Well-operating open sourcing communities are meritocracies of volunteers. Respect for similarly-minded peers tends to encourage retention, otherwise people move on to other projects.

These three issues on (i) developing distinctive chargeable features, (ii) anticipating customer requests, and (ii) contributing to the commons, incorporate concerns mixed across opening sourcing and private sourcing programs. The decisions that organizations make can and do influence relationships and outcomes.