April 16, 2008 9:04 AM PDT

Openbravo's open commitment: A model for Google

Posted by Matt Asay

Yesterday I suggested that Google could allay a lot of concerns about what it intends to do with others' applications, data, etc. by firmly committing to open source, open data, and open APIs. Today, albeit on a much smaller scale, open-source ERP provider, Openbravo, did just that with the Openbravo Manifesto.

Here are just two of the commitments Openbravo made:

Open Source: A functional version of our software is always published under an open source license. Our goal is to enable any person with the required skills to install, configure and use Openbravo ERP and POS in a production environment.

Open access to the development trunk: We guarantee read access to the main development trunk for everyone. Commit access is provided to all people that have demonstrated technical skills.

This is precisely the sort of commitment that allows partners, customers, and community developers to trust a company, when backed up by appropriate licensing (as it is in Openbravo's case). Openbravo is tiny compared to Google. Imagine how much more of an impact this sort of commitment would have if used by Google?

In fact, I'm willing to bet that Openbravo would allow Google to plagiarize its Manifesto for Google's own use. Any takers there in Mountain View?

Disclosure: I am an advisor to Openbravo.