Something that is free and open source (FOSS) is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. It stands in contrast to how many goods are made - with labor funded by private capital and protected as intellectual property.

In talking about open source, we grapple with fundamental questions of “how should we make stuff”? Who decides what gets made? Who owns it? Who are the stakeholders and how are they involved? What does ownership mean - is it public, part of a commons, something else? Is it made by a group or is a single person behind it? How does work start, continue or end? How is it divided up? Who gets credit? Who pays or gets paid? What values should guide our work? These questions can lead to a radical rethink of work. Or it can just mirror or support what’s currently happening with a few practical modifications. Or it can be a mix. In light of reckoning over the resignation and then controversial reinstatement of free software founder Richard Stallman from the Free Software Foundation, this is an exploration via tech, design, and ideological perspectives of what open source is and could be.