Mozilla Open Innovation Project

The concept of innovation, specifically the notion of technology as a tool for the further propagation of innovation in society has been promoted extensively since the rise of the IT sector around the world (Johannessen, 1994). Firms that were seen as technology based or technology focussed often were seen as creating and enabling an innovation value chain, by virtue of their sector alone (Ganotakis & Love, 2012). Though steadily growing since the 1990s the tech industry, surviving the dot com crash in the early 2000s, truly began its dominance over other sectors post the 2008 recession leading to a large-scale assumption that technology was an insulated sector promoting employment in times where other industries were faltering (Rosenberg, 2018, Axios.com; Evans, 2019, Techcrunch.com). The overwhelming belief that exists today is that technology is an innovation enabler for all around the world. Fountain in 1998 had noted how the collaborative model of different institutions from educational institutions, government contracts and private players had enabled a collaborative ecosystem for the nascent Silicon Valley enabling further innovation in the tech sector (Fountain, 1998).

However, in recent years this theory has been refuted, with experts arguing that the tech ecosystem continued to propagate what other sectors had implemented before – enforcing social and class hierarchies observed around the world. Hyman reports that in the 1980’s, the manufacture of tech products such as Apple’s Macintosh computers happened in a factory model or a piece work setup, often relying on female migrant workers to create products that were seen as revolutionary to the larger public (Hyman, 2018). Though once situated in the Silicon Valley, production centres have since moved to different countries around the world, predominantly Asian countries such as China, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines (Costello, 2021 Lifewire.com). We see in recent years that despite the larger global reliance on technology and technology enabled services or solutions, there is a monopolisation of technology by companies referred to as bigtech, specifically Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google (Clayton, 2020).

Yet, as early as the 1970s there had begun a movement for the free and fair distribution and ownership for software (Bretthauer, 2001). This movement eventually gave rise to ideas and people, such as Stallman’s copyleft which repurposes the existing copyright frameworks for the larger use of software among the general public (Bretthauer, 2001). Eventually, the movement began to diverge, with free software seen as how technology practices could be more open to users with different needs and requirements. Stallman likened it to free speech and not free beer (Stallman, 2009). These movements also led to the understanding of who the stakeholders were in the tech ecosystem. Eventually, with the complexity of the internet leading towards Benkler’s definition of commons based peer production, where individuals were provided equal opportunities for participation, and the community assessing skills and distribution of tasks which were seen as a revolt against hegemonic practices in play (Papadimitropoulos, 2019). Other concepts like the recursive publics also looked at the stakeholders under the movement (Kelty, 2008). Here, stakeholders were not merely the creators and users of the software but were also integral in pushing for the maintenance, improvements and the creation of a legal protection for the larger use of such systems.

Since its inception, the open source software and the free software movements were largely centered in the global north, and often aided by big tech companies such as IBM and Intel (Cammaerts, 2011). However, neoliberal globalisation once observed as the absorption of improved technologies and services and free market ideologies (Fourcade- Gourinchas, M. & Babb, S.L., 2002) had a different effect in different countries around the world. Many argue that the failure of the open source movement coincides with the rise of the sharing economy which focussed on the peer to peer transfer of knowledge and information curtailing the open frameworks highlighted by the movement (Papadimitropoulos, 2019, Keller & Tarkowski).

The implementation of FOSS participation in the global south doesn’t necessarily work in the same manner. Large scale digital divide, seen not only in countries as a whole but between different communities within those countries, based on geographical locations, infrastructural variations and other factors have had an impact on FOSS participation (Dunn, 2010). Scholars have argued that the very model and thinking produced by the technology systems remain entrenched in the worldview of the global north, thus requiring a decolonial shift in the creation and distribution of technology in the global south (Moyo, 2017). Yet certain countries from the global south have adapted the open source movement through push by governments in those countries (Camara & Fonseca, 2007). A highlight is Brazil which saw how technology experts gave a rise to a counter-hegemonic structure to the knowledge economy, with the government enforcing the use of open source software for the public sector (Shaw, 2011).

Thus we see, the practices that worked in the global north have slowly been diluted by the rise of other types of tech based organisations, focussed on peer to peer networks relationships. We also observe from the literature that the global south has often utilised and enabled tools of the government for the promotion of FLOSS software in the country. Thus it comes as no surprise that the Indian government has also begun to exercise stronger controls of platform innovation in the country (Raghavan, et al, 2019). India was often seen as a consumer of FOSS services and not the creator or contributor to the movement (Joseph, 2010). According to Github India now ranks as the third largest user of FOSS, with more developers preferring to use FOSS libraries and solutions. However there is a lack of homegrown FOSS innovations in the country despite employing a large skilled population in the IT sector (Godhwani & Mittal, 2021, The Hindu BusinessLine).

Cultural hierarchies such as caste and class continue to play a role in education and training in tech and tech enabled services even today, even when experiments were created to reduce the digital divide and enable more participation in technology sectors (Sarkar, 2016). This can also be seen in tech startups and the demographics of individuals often leading such projects (Bhattacharya, 2018, Scroll.in). Similarly, critics argue that the government’s investments towards public platforms that were supposed to enable innovation in the Indian market instead continue to provide further obstacles for those without social capital to be a part of the fray (Dharmakumar, 2017, TheKen.com). Highlighting the monopolising of data of the population for personal gains rather than public good. Many also argue that such platforms, due to the manner in which they are governed, fail the test of open source.

Therefore there exists two large questions that need to be answered while trying to wrestle with the concept of innovation in India, the first being if government intervention had promoted open source software in other countries, what was the Indian government’s role in the promotion of the movement in the country. And the second question that needed to be raised was how is the digital divide in the country further destabilizing opportunities for open source software development in the country.