The Open-Source "Genius Bar"

Since a couple of months ago, I've started to ask myself how to start an organization focused to educating and helping people to move to using open-source software. It is not enough talking, and giving examples, of open-source software with which proprietary software can be replaced with, it is just as important to teach people how to use it.

For example, you can convince people to make the jump to LibreOffice from Microsoft Office. Yet, since they don't work exactly the same, without help during the transition people will grow frustrated and move back. What makes things worse, is that they might go back believing that LibreOffice is bad, when it is a real alternative to Microsoft Office.

The same goes for every other app, and operating system, without proper support to help people make the best of them the transition will not happen. Which having a physical place where people can go for help is a barrier for the adoption of open-source software. Just having online resources is not enough, since not everyone has access to them or knows how to make use of them.

Having someone to help you solve problems, or just show you how to do something, in person makes the whole experience better, and easier. Not only that, it generates a level of trust that just reading a document does. Also having how-to videos is helpful, but it is a supplement. Nothing beats having people to help you with your doubts, or teach you what you need.

Not only that, having access to people that help you with whatever you needs helps to build community. That is something that the open-source software movement values, because at the end it is not just about the software itself. It is about creating a community of people to make open-source software better and be what it's users need. Not only developing it, but also giving feedback about what it needs to become better.

From bugs to features, without user feedback development won't go in the direction it needs to go. Seeing how the users actually make use of the software, makes it easier to understands things that just reading a report ever will. There are nuances that can't be related in writing easily, or are overlooked because they aren't considered important to be shared.

More importantly, if we want small and medium businesses, not say corporations, to adopt open-source software we need to get the people who make them up to start and be comfortable using it. If individuals aren't comfortable using it, it will be quite difficult to get businesses to make the jump, not to say imposible. Only after that, software developers that currently focus on proprietary software will even consider to make the jump to open-source development.

This is why I want to start a place where people can come to and have learn in physical place how to make the jump, and learn how to use their apps. Making it so, would also give them the chance to meet other people who use open-source software and see that they are just like them. At the end open-source software should give people the tools they need, without them having to be experts, or know how to code.

At the end, open-source software should be about the people who use it.