Tim O’Reilly discussing history of OSCON: Started out as The Perl Conference twelve years ago. We’re apparently really crappy at keeping our history. Early conferences had a track on Tcl/Tk! Steve Jobs and Mark Shuttleworth separated at birth? Open Source related jobs are about 1 in 55 for tech companies, 1 in 385 jobs in non-tech companies. The number has grown over the years. Linux jobs up 19%, Perl down 7%, Python up 56% (but sixth overall).

Three big challenges and opportunities: cloud computing, the (open) programmable web, and open mobile. Cloud computing means we’re subject to other people’s failures.

Also, “web” doesn’t mean http, it also means things like XMPP. Today it even means “phone”.

Programmable web: data is becoming a new source of value and lock-in. We need to think about this. e.g. CDDB, Kindle. Because of competition, people are pushing in the other direction: Yahoo! BOSS service, Dopplr…

Open mobile: the browser wars are back. iPhone app store is drawing a lot of developers. “Google understands that if the mobile phone isn’t open, they’re toast.” They understand how much they depend on the open source ecosystem. And the OS community is there: OpenMoko, Android.

Christine Peterson on Open Source Physical Security. “Problems that start in the US tend to spill over and hurt people elsewhere.” The future, it’s not just electronic, it’s also physical. Nanotech-based sensors are easily programmable. They’re already being used in sewers. They can be abused, though. Things worth detecting: WMDs. But fear + poor data on WMDs leads to bad things. Result: more surveillance. DC only has top-down tools, and they don’t notice our debates. They’re trying to solve a bottom-up problem (terrorism) with top-down tools. Rabble rabble nerds are the best to fix this rabble rabble.

Dirk Hohndel on Moblin, Linux for Next Generation Mobile Internet. The vision is about the internet, mobility, flexibility, and extensibility. We need an Eee PC that doesn’t have a $2000 price tag, it needs to be more $300-500. The fear of lock-in to a platform is greater to many people than data lock-in. A year ago Intel started Moblin and invited other people to join them. Unfortunately most people that joined were looking to make a buck, not many open source people came in. They’re looking for more open source people to come in.

And then something about MySQL happened, and I went to the expo hall.

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