The Hidden Benefit of Giving Back to Open Source Software (Working Knowledge)

The Harvard Business School's "Working Knowledge" site has anarticle arguing that it can pay for companies to allow their developersto contribute back to the projects whose software they use."And that presents an interesting dilemma for firms that rely heavilyon open source. Should they allow employees on company time to make updatesand edits to the software for community use that could be used bycompetitors? New research by Assistant Professor Frank Nagle, a member ofthe Strategy Unit at Harvard Business School, shows that paying employeesto contribute to such software boosts the company's productivity from usingthe software by as much as 100 percent, when compared with free-ridingcompetitors."