I have written a draft for the abstract for my dissertation (see below). Its worth noting that the reason I am publishing my work in progress on my blog is due to the nature of my dissertation. As I writing around the theme of open source I see it fit for my work to be out in the public domain…although technically all work I produce at this moment in time is owned by the university!

Since Richard Stallman and his Free Software Foundation’s vision of a wholly free operating system and the harmonious marriage between the FSF’s work and Torvalds’ Linux kernel development there has been no going back. GNU/Linux gave birth to the foundations of the open source movement we see today. Free(dom) software has taken Information Technology by storm and it shows no signs of stopping with the open source ideology of being able to freely improve upon an existing product and redistribute it for a larger benefit transforming the way we use and interact with software, information resources and the web.

Through the use of open source and free(dom) software and with very little effort, knowledge or capital input individuals can now collaborate to produce products and reach markets that only large companies and corporations could previously (Tapsott, 2007: 11). This is providing a step up for small time producers and individuals to compete with well established businesses and will take the unprepared by surprise. Organisations such as YouTube and MySpace are founding a new form of business that sidesteps this attack on the economy and utilises the urge to mass collaborate. Termed Wikinomics, this new business model creates ‘real value for participants’ (Tapscott, 2007: 11) and has proved to be extremely lucrative for their founders. Traditional business models face the threat of becoming outdated and obsolete when trying to compete with the new age of collaboration and un-savvy businesses face an uncertain future where ‘only the connected will survive’ (Tapscott, 2007: 12).

This dissertation will strive to outline the problem facing the economy in that it lags behind many other markets in the free and open sharing of knowledge for superior outcomes. This has the potential to facilitate an economic meltdown giving way to a free(dom) world if businesses don’t embrace the collaboration age. I hope to prove that by utilising collaboration companies can produce better end user driven content, goods and services and can save the emerging global economy from falling at the first hurdle.