Here’s an interesting criticism of BCCDIY – that it risks “devaluing the commercial aspects of digital marketing“. I’m not sure what that phrase means exactly, but I’m guessing it’s along the lines of ‘if you give your time away for free that devalues everyone else’.
Here’s a comment I left on the article that’s not showing up yet:
Interesting article, and it seems to have sparked some twitter conversation – whilst I agree with many of your points, as one of the originators of the BCCDIY project I’d like a little bit more from you on why you think that the project could potentially risk “devaluing the commercial aspects of digital marketing”.
The project is an open source approach to designing a city council website using a user-centred philosophy.
I would say that having a strong open-source community adopting that thinking in a city is a good thing.
This blog itself is built on the open source Wordpress platform, which was put together by Matt Mullenweg and an army of volunteers. On one hand you could say that releasing an easy to use blogging platform harmed the industry – businesses at that point were building their own commercial systems and subsequently lost clients and saw budgets reduce.
On the other it is easier to argue that systems like Wordpress offer a set of tools that enable commercial activity built on them, create jobs, and expand the numbers of people who use digital media tools, and thus leading to higher demand for digital services like marketing.
Suggesting that BCCDIY is bad for the industry because of its open source ethos certainly sounds a little protectionist, as if pointing out that there are easy ways to achieve functionality that is good from a user’s point of view is a bad thing, because jobs will be lost. I’m hoping that’s not what you’re suggesting.
If you’re viewing BCCDIY through purely monetary ‘value’ (discounting the idea that if in some ways it’s better than the original then it must be worth more), we came up with a very rough estimate of person-hours put into the project over the two weeks it was created, and came out with a figure of £38,000 of equivalent agency hours, should the work have had a client to send a bill to. (I estimate ‘rough’).
I agree with Jo and think that viewing the project as a stand-alone outside of the community of people who got involved risks devaluing one of Birmingham’s unique selling points – that collaborative instinct combined with a supportive environment.
I would also most certainly hope that just the act of volunteering one’s time for a few hours for a project that one believes in is not something to be discouraged because it might potentially devalue the work of others.
Here’s a quote from Tim Berners Lee on how governments should be using the web, and is more than a little one of the inspirations for BCCDIY – link: http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/GovData.html
Government data is being put online to increase accountability, contribute valuable information about the world, and to enable government, the country, and the world to function more efficiently. All of these purposes are served by putting the information on the Web as Linked Data. Start with the “low-hanging fruit”. Whatever else, the raw data should be made available as soon as possible. Preferably, it should be put up as Linked Data. As a third priority, it should be linked to other sources. As a lower priority, nice user interfaces should be made to it — if interested communities outside government have not already done it.
Please note the last part of that quote – interested communities. BCCDIY is at the front of what I think will be a change in the way that we use/reuse government data and information.
Viewing BCCDIY purely through the lens of digital marketing misses the point – this isn’t about a good looking website that markets something – this is about what we as citizens of a city expect from our local government through the web to enable us to interact with the city’s services and information in ways that suit our needs.
3 Comments
I agree with your point totally. I love the fact that Clarity use Wordpress themselves.
I think BCCDIY proves that action is better than the typical British way of moaning and not doing something about it.
BCCDIY has quite obviously proved that it is not “devaluing the commercial aspects of digital marketing” by the buzz the project has created. This would not be the case without voulenteers, a good cause, and a real objective.
If anything BCCDIY has highlighted a problem, and proven that there is a community out there of passionate individuals ready to solve it.
(that was my extra long tweet). phew.
Stef,
I like what you and the community have done, it's fantastic and a great example for others.
When you say BCCDIY has an “open source ethos”, are you referring to the Github and the licence for the software you've written and adapted? (Is it GPL?)
I think it's worth having some precision about different kinds of work and value contribution.
I've been thinking about open source a lot and I don't think it helps understanding to refer to anything other than code as open source.
Volunteering your time for a one-off installation is something you decide to do because you're a decent sort of guy or girl. Or I guess because of other reasons like getting a “portfolio” that leads to paid work. Or because you enjoy it. Or because you're a masochist!
Whatever the motivation(s), I don't think “open source” can sensibly be used to describe this gesture. It's maybe a metaphor at best.
I'll talk about GPL because that's the licence I'm most familiar with. And it's the licence WordPress uses. The GPL licence applies to code intended to be distributed, through sale or other copying. So you can still use open source software for a one-off installation, tweak it and not be required to release it under GPL. (Although you can release it, but you would have to use GPL.)
You can get paid for this work or, as your team did here, do it for free. Obviously you can also get paid for setting up something proprietary. So open source or not is kind of nothing to do with the volunteering aspect.
In a sense you've done two good deeds if you're releasing the code open source as well (for other councils and volunteers etc.). It's worth being clear about that, rather than lumping it all under open source! I don't know if I'm stating the obvious here or not.
You are even entitled to set up a hosted service like wordpress.com called Council Website In A Box – or whatever – and now charge councils to get accounts if it's one-off. But if you travel from council to council installing it on different servers, I think that counts as distribution and you're required by GPL to release it open source.
Stef,
I like what you and the community have done, it's fantastic and a great example for others.
When you say BCCDIY has an “open source ethos”, are you referring to the Github and the licence for the software you've written and adapted? (Is it GPL?)
I think it's worth having some precision about different kinds of work and value contribution.
I've been thinking about open source a lot and I don't think it helps understanding to refer to anything other than code as open source.
Volunteering your time for a one-off installation is something you decide to do because you're a decent sort of guy or girl. Or I guess because of other reasons like getting a “portfolio” that leads to paid work. Or because you enjoy it. Or because you're a masochist!
Whatever the motivation(s), I don't think “open source” can sensibly be used to describe this gesture. It's maybe a metaphor at best.
I'll talk about GPL because that's the licence I'm most familiar with. And it's the licence WordPress uses. The GPL licence applies to code intended to be distributed, through sale or other copying. So you can still use open source software for a one-off installation, tweak it and not be required to release it under GPL. (Although you can release it, but you would have to use GPL.)
You can get paid for this work or, as your team did here, do it for free. Obviously you can also get paid for setting up something proprietary. So open source or not is kind of nothing to do with the volunteering aspect.
In a sense you've done two good deeds if you're releasing the code open source as well (for other councils and volunteers etc.). It's worth being clear about that, rather than lumping it all under open source! I don't know if I'm stating the obvious here or not.
You are even entitled to set up a hosted service like wordpress.com called Council Website In A Box – or whatever – and now charge councils to get accounts if it's one-off. But if you travel from council to council installing it on different servers, I think that counts as distribution and you're required by GPL to release it open source.