Open Source Summit North America 2018

Standards setting organisations have a long-standing history in facilitating technical innovation dating back more than one hundred years. The acknowledgement of the positive economic, social and political impact of standardisation resulted in strong ties between industry, government and academia, leading to the establishment of national standards bodies and international standardisation organisations. While it is commonly assumed that a close cooperation between standard setting and Open Source communities would be beneficial, both sides struggle to establish successful models of collaboration. It is especially unclear where standard setting and Open Source compete for relevance, and where they are complementary. The qualitative study at the Technical University of Berlin provides answers to this question based on a comparative SWOT analysis that will be presented.