Plan of attack – part 1

I think the structure of my essay will be along these lines:

Introduction – briefly talk about gifts, the gift economy and open source development and distribution. Outline the structure of the rest of the chapters
Gifts – examine gift giving in other cultures as in the research by Mauss, blood donations and the gift as a tool for solidarity. Also look at how artists have to distinguish between the gift of their art and making a living.
Open source – brief explanation of its history, look at the rise of open source using linux and Netscape Navigator/Firefox as examples, the collaborative nature of working and the importance of the internet to it.
Project – describe the project, how it relates to gifts/giving and open source and document its progress.
Conclusion – go over relevant points and how they fit in with the suggestion that open source is a viable alternative to the market economy model of software development and distribution. Also on the success (or not) of the project.

For the project, I still need to decide which base distro to go for. I’m leaning towards Ubuntu but might have to bite the bullet and experiment with a few. I’m gonna have a chat with some linux gurus I know both online and in the real world and see what they suggest. Once I’ve sorted that out, will draw up a list of applications that I want to include and then make it…..and document it at the same time to help plan for the workshop. Talking of which, I need to speak to Caroline at PAC and see if there might be interest in doing one there. I need to get my head around how I’m gonna market/distribute it. I really like the idea of it “going solo” but I keep coming back to the idea of having some sort of affiliation as it would no doubt help to raise its profile. I think I need to ponder this some more.