Europe created the web and Linux. Tim Burners-Lee, an Oxford graduate working at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory near Geneva, invented the Internet hypermedia called the World Wide Web. Linus Torvalds was a student at the University of Helsinki when he wrote the Linux software system. So what are the lessons here?
Business is not the only leader in the technological revolution. Arguably the most radical technological developments in our time, the Web and the Linux operating system, were developed on the open-source model — in which people give away their creations openly for others to use, test and develop. But even though the open-source movement was originally about individuals joining forces, business and society at large can still learn from it. Indeed, there are two big lessons we should take from what the open-source people call the "hacker ethic." (Of course they don't mean hacker as computer criminal, but rather the original sense of the word: a person who is passionate about his work and wants to share the results with others.)
The first lesson is, naturally, openness. I have acted
as an adviser on information society issues to companies
like Nokia and successive governments in Finland, and
one thing I have emphasized is that the "closed" model
is not what has generated the most important innovations
in the information economy. In global competition, a revolution
is not made by one person but by a network of rebels,
and that requires openness. Just consider the fate of
the closed Apple architecture vs. IBM's open PC model.
Consider the European telecoms that got a head start thanks
to the open NMT/GSM standards. Now, however, Europe's
steep license fees for third-generation networks are killing
the power of openness that was driving Europe's biggest
technological success. European governments should join
in canceling these fees.
Openness also has an ethical dimension. I was |
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HENNA AALTONEN for TIME PEKKA
HIMANEN consider the fate of the closed Apple architecture
vs. IBM's open PC model
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able to meet with company and
government representatives from developing
countries at last month's World Economic Forum
annual meeting. In Africa alone, there are
25 million HIV/AIDS victims who cannot get
medicine because the patented version is too
expensive. This is unacceptable. For a long-term
change, a "Japanese leap" would be needed.
It is worth remembering that Japan's postwar
transformation into a strong economy was initially
based on copying information from the West,
and that proved to be very beneficial both
to them and to us. This kind of leap should
not be thwarted by pushing unfair intellectual
property rights in the World Trade Organization.
A second lesson is the hackers' relationship
to work. Hackers like Berners-Lee and Torvalds
explain that their ilk accomplish great things
because they are passionate about what they
do. Having a genuine interest in your work
can free up your creativity and energy, infuse
your life with joy and meaning, and allow
you to realize your potential as a human being.
This is different from the old Protestant
ethic, which taught that work should be regarded
as the highest duty. The most successful companies
are already starting to understand that in
the information economy the Protestant ethic
must be replaced by the hacker ethic, because
the main challenge now is to enhance creativity.
In the 1990s Nokia, for example, transformed
its work culture very much along these lines
by going out of its way to recruit creative
people and establish an atmosphere of trust
that gives them the space to realize their
ideas.
In addition to rejecting the idea of work
as the main duty in life, hackers want to
develop technology that allows a better balance
between labor and leisure. One of the strangest
things about technological "progress" is how
it has made our lives even more stressful.
For many of us, it is not just that the work
day is crowded with quotidian tasks, but that
our home time has also adopted a work-day
model: 5:30-5:45, take child to sports practice;
5:45-6:30, gym; 6:30-7:20, therapy session;
7:20-8:00, pick up child from practice, prepare
food and eat; 8:00-11:00, watch television
with family; 11:00-11:30, conversation time
with spouse; 11:30-11:45, other attention
paid to spouse (occasionally) ... Where are
the trade unions demanding a balance between
work and leisure?
Ultimately, the main question about the technological
revolution is what values we want to guide
it. The hacker ethic is proposing a way European
companies and societies can become a global
example of a more open, more human information
age.
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PROMOTION
