Drupal

the business of open source

These slides are from a talk I gave at DrupalCon in Washington DC on March 6th, 2009. The basic gist is applying the technical principles of Open Source to business practices. It was really fun to give, and the audience was full of super smart, thoughtful people. The discussion after the talk was cool, and it was great to meet new OS biz buddies as well.

My secret of the last year.

So. I have been working on a cool new thing for a year now, and I finally get to talk about it. Whee!!

It's a new company launching an awesome product. (I'll be the President + COO.) We couldn't agree on a Codename for the company, so we... uh... incorporated as "Codename Enterprises". Cheeky, right? ;-)

Here's an overview of what we're doing:

Codename Enterprises is creating an open social publishing platform allowing ordinary people, companies and organizations to create extraordinary websites. The company is led by Ed Sussman, former President of Mansueto Digital (where he ran Inc.com + FastCompany.com among others), and is a partnership between Lullabot (the company I run as Managing Partner) and Bond Art + Science (an awesome usability company with amazing people).

The platform will provide a simple way for average users to create dynamic, feature rich websites that previously required extensive work by developers. The product will offer a user-friendly drag-and-drop interface along with easy-to-use design tools. The product leverages the popular open source Drupal framework, and will be entirely free from lock-down. Users will be able to choose between functionality such as wikis, media sharing, social networking and social publishing. Pretty exciting, right?

This will be built on Drupal. One of my passions is running a business built on open source software, and I am super-excited to get to start up a new company based on the open principles that we've used to run Lullabot.

The platform will be super-empowering, and always have a free version. The product will always be open - users will own their data - unlike, say, Facebook, where your friends are not "owned" by you - or like when you pay a small web design company to make your website but they control the access instead of you. Also, open source is inherently a meritocracy, and it feels good to be in a workplace where things work the same way.

From a personal standpoint, I am looking forward to getting to be a part of a product that is going to empower so many people. From a professional standpoint, I am excited to work to build a platform that will benefit so many other businesses (both development shops, who will use this as a starting point from which to build kick-ass websites, and those small businesses who will now be able to have free or lower-cost dynamic websites).

A lot of what's hit the press so far is about our CEO, as well as some about the general launch. Here are some resources to read more about it:

*The big (rushed) announcement
*My colleage Jeff Eaton's post
(A great technical overview)
*Our new CEO's explanation of why we are doing it now
(In the midst of all this financial turmoil)
*A bit in MediaBistro
*A gossip piece in Valleywag
(not truth - the truth is in the comments, but apparently they care, which must be a good sign)
*Our entry on CrunchBase
(A company tracking site)

I'll post again when we start tracking for Beta invites, which will be shortly. Exciting times are ahead!

Los Angeles

Hit up LA during the first week of February for more of those Lullabot workshops.

The weather was nice, but I kind of wanted it to be nicer.

We rented a convertible and drove around with the top down like only tourists do in February.

We stayed at The Hotel Portofino. The place was absolutely gorgeous. The service was really great as well. The view was fantastic. I took this picture of some scuba divers from the balcony.

I also got taken on The. Best. First. Date. Ever.>

Portland

Went to Portland for the Lullabot workshops in January '08.

Stayed at The Hotel deLuxe. What a cool little hotel! Their theme is "Old Hollywood", and it's all over the place in the details. It was really pretty and the service was amazing. Very highly recommended!

Also, really enjoyed shopping at Canoe. They have a very well curated selection of gifts and home items. Picked up a little something for Mindy.

Hit the photobooth at Little Finnegan's, as per Cori.

Overall, really enjoyed spending some time in PDX. Winter there is cold and rainy, but it's still so green! Wish I had more free time, there are some neat shops and galleries and restaurants there!