Coolie No 1.
Why open source software community is relatively non-existent in India? I’ve pondered about this for sometime. I’ve been searching the net and reading too.
Occasionally, I tried opening this topic with some of my developer buddies who are equally divided between the Microsoft camp and the Sun camp but not one in the LAMPP clan as yet. Ask any fresher and he is 1000 times more likely to idolize Gates than to even know about Richard Stallman or Torvalds. Why is that?
And then I thought about myself.
What do I, the IT professional do in my spare time? I read books, blogs – usually time pass stuff and nothing even remotely technical. I travel 45 mins. one way to office in city traffic and I have to consider myself lucky. For I know some who travel 40 km one way using buses and trains. For them coming to office and going home is in itself a project.
At work, we, the typical IT junta in India, do what is expected of us. Nothing extraordinary. Nothing bad either. We go to work because we want to earn good money legally and ethically at the end of the month. We take pride in working for big companies with big customers in established platforms.
For most of us, IT is a job. But for most of the folks in the open source community, it’s a passion.
Open source allows one an opportunity to not only use a product free but also contribute to the creating the tool we would use everyday. But for that we need to devote as much of our free time as possible,and slog without any monetary benefit. And for that, we need to have passion for what we do. Where do we stand in terms of passion for what we do? Not very high from what I’ve seen.
Whatever little passion in us is being dozed of in no time when one enters large software companies. A bulk of the productive time is being wasted in unnecessary meetings, pointless discussions, long lunch breaks, leisurely tea breaks, irritating politics and long work schedules at the behest of the project manager. Not to mention most of the time, one works on projects that suck big time.
There is another contributor to this - our education system. Here we have one system which almost always peels a banana and thrusts it in our mouth and moves our jaws so that the banana is eaten in a time frame and pace chosen by the system rather than to our interest. Our system does not care if we like banana or orange or pomegranate. It’s solely at the discretion of the person who sets the course.
Our wonderful employers, the darlings of the stock market and papers like Economic Times, don’t help either. They have a simple yardstick for recruiting people - BE/MCA 65% with no arrears. They are less concerned about if a guy is passionate about his job or not. They would rather worry about if a recruit will convince the Visa officer when he goes for his H1 stamping. They would want someone who will slog if being asked to like a dog 24/7 without asking questions.
That means more low-end work, more projects, more money, better Q1/2/3/4 margins, better returns in the stock market. And everyone is happy.
India has lakhs of people who are employed in software. But then I realize there is a world of difference between employed in software and being passionate about software.
This is all the more reason why we worship and defend and admire Kamal Haasan or Sachin or Rahman or Ilayraja as if our life depended on it. For unlike us, they are passionate about their works.
Just like a mason is unlikely to think about sand to cement ratio at home, we don’t think about software in our free time. We’d rather talk about Mani Ratnam’s GURU, gossip about Surya-Jothika and be happy. No wonder we are called IT coolies by some. Maybe we can call ourselves Coolie No 1, If that would make us feel any better.
July 21st, 2006 at 1:05 pm
superb article prabhu.
July 21st, 2006 at 1:46 pm
Netthi adi po Karthik. True to the core. Picturing me in this scenario, I believe, I’m passionate about my code and the software I create at my work.
I can talk about it to anyone who is interested for hours. Even though, my employer doesn’t pay me great, he allows me to be creative and be passionate about what you do. That’s nice and I’m happy in that context.
July 21st, 2006 at 3:25 pm
sad that i can never be passionate for anything i do for money..it is like selling and i would never sell anything that is precious ( or that which i am passionate about..we are passionate about writing, which is why we blog…can i call blog, open-source????)
i understood the banana part , made me feel like a monkey….
July 21st, 2006 at 3:27 pm
in fact work funds my passion
hope the HR are not reading this…
:))
July 21st, 2006 at 3:59 pm
This post has been removed by the author.
July 21st, 2006 at 4:05 pm
this not only prevails at work but i could see many of the students of class 12 madly rushing for ECE n EEE last yr.(i donno abt this year).its a mere hype and they really dont seem to have any passion for what they choose for studies atleast(noteven passion atleast some basic interest.They simplay fall in mad rush for some subject that is hyped that year)and then happily end up in some well paid software job forgetting and not knowing y the hell they chose a NON-IT stream and end up in IT field.Naturally there comes lack of interest in the job and working just for pay thus becoming a so called “glorified coolie”(PS:This is one of my opinions.But there are many IT guys as well working just for pay alone and there are lot many NON-IT ians who are capable of putting much more effort than the regular IT guys)
July 21st, 2006 at 6:53 pm
very true - spoon fed nation. mostly.
staying true to the profession, we should call ourselves, coolie version 1.0
July 21st, 2006 at 7:27 pm
Is there anything wrong by not being part of OSS ? Or conversely what’s the benefit of being in OSS ?
If it’s just some brainy-fun to be part of OSS, I think we have enough in India. There’s even a girl who blogs about Linux et all. As I see OSS is another exclusive club that would like to project itself as something different.
July 21st, 2006 at 8:52 pm
paurna,
danks man:)
gopinath
danks da!
monu,
indha selling part is a bit tricky. i’ll answer it later
July 21st, 2006 at 8:54 pm
shobana,
u r spot on with yr example!i wish i’d quoted that in my post
munimma,
kandippa. the evidence of which r ample..
coolie version 1.0 is apt:)
but if at all we will upgrade only time will tell:)
July 21st, 2006 at 9:14 pm
PK kalakkal nalla sonnappa
July 21st, 2006 at 9:19 pm
anon,
according to me participation in open source is an outward manifestation of one’s curiosity, yearning to learn and explore new things.
if u read the post thoroughly u will understand that its not just about the merits of open source. its about a mindset to approach work. from whatever little i’ve seen in India’s IT industry, that mindset is lacking. a vast majority see this as a job. nothing more nothing less.
its similiar to a labourer who sweats it out bcos he has to. so long as that is the case, we may make lots in terms of exports but not be able to be the pioneers in software in terms of innovation.
this also has a lot to do with the kind of project companies take.
And also our education system.
Indians are good, quick learners.
Are we good creators? Only time will tell.
I’ll ask u another question in return. whats the big benefit of going to a software job just like a 9 to 5 public sector bank job??
July 21st, 2006 at 9:36 pm
Good one for the day PK…
July 21st, 2006 at 10:27 pm
karthik - my comments for this ‘will be’ in priyums-canvas..Again got tired of writing a lot..and my comments ran to pages..
July 22nd, 2006 at 12:41 am
super article PK,
i agree with all that u have said about why OSS is not a passion in india and would like to add that - away from work (home that is) we dont have the infrastructure to do it like in the US etc.
July 22nd, 2006 at 6:37 am
ganesh,
thanks ganesh!
cipher,
nandri. aprom indha week evlo padam partheenga?
priyums,
pls do so.i checked yr blog posts onnum illai.
ksprabhu,
dank u
July 22nd, 2006 at 11:30 pm
Most Indians have this mentality of judging everything/everyone by some kind of ‘label’. It could be the college you study, degree, the marks, caste/community,income etc etc..
In the US, I see the sharp difference between us and the locals. Leaving aside racism, most people are unconcerned about which University/School you are from or the marks you got there. While most Indians are concerned about atleast
the college. What matters really to these people is whether you deliver the goods.
Naturally , open source doesnt have
the kind of label that Microsoft has nor are there the kind of heroes like Bill Gates.
There are even people who argue that Bill Gates is the richest guy and therefore Microsoft is the Best.
July 23rd, 2006 at 4:07 am
Your last sentence made me LOL :))) What a superb justification!
July 23rd, 2006 at 4:50 am
pk,
yes Indians are good creators. Isn’t Bollywood, Kollywood an exellent example ? Did we not take Cinema, a western creation and beautifully moulded it in to our liking. Do u want to know the reason ? Because Cinema allowed us to express ourselves in our own language.
Software still requires good command over English language because there’s no book that teaches me how to write code in my language. Therefore software is still alienated from my life and hence I am not curious.
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:11 am
So true PK
July 24th, 2006 at 8:27 am
You are only partly right and passion it turns out is a product of socio-economic circumstances as well. I posted my thoughts on this sometime back.
http://www.inblogs.net/cycle-gap/2006/01/indian-code-contribution-to-floss.html
It looks like self-flagellation comes to us easily and we indulge in it too often.
July 24th, 2006 at 10:31 am
It is different in the research community. People have freedom in selecting how they want to solve a problem. But with so many product-driven, legacy-system based companies, it is hard to be that flexible.
Which is why IT junta state that “i work in C#” rather than saying “i work to solve so and so problem using C#”.
July 24th, 2006 at 10:57 am
mahesh,
i cudn’t agree more!
TTM,
anon,
When i said creators, i meant in the software context.
i wud’ve been happy if u’d cited indian epics and other literature.
WA,
danks u:)
July 24th, 2006 at 10:59 am
rams,
welcome here.
i think its a mindset issue rather than a socia-economic issue.
no comments on the self-flagellations part.
tt-giant,
welcome here. maybe.
July 25th, 2006 at 9:08 am
Prabhu:
Thanks for the welcome.
By socio-economic I mean the general condition of the middle class and their ability to purchase computers and gadgets for their kids. Access to computers and other cultural factors such as attitude towards technology are other factors covered by the catch-all term socio-economic factors. Maybe that term automatically brings ‘reservations’ to mind and maybe that’s why we react with such revulsion to it :-).
In the blog post that I made, I also linked to a post by Sudhakar Chandrasekaran (Thaths) - who is an Indian who has been involved FLOSS development for a long time and is familiar with both community and technical aspects of it. Thaths after working with open source communities for a long time here and abroad, and observing American hackers for a long time, comes to the conclusion, that it’s more a question of comfort-level with computers. My previous job was for a company that employed many top-notch open source hackers and authors of O’Reilly books. I am forced to come to the same conclusion. Most of these have had very early exposure to computers, typically before the age of ten and exposure to very technically active communities. Having said that I have to admit that this is a really complex question and we don’t really have a good answer.
Why open source software community is relatively non-existent in India? You must be joking. The Chennai Linux user’s group, for example, is very active - Maybe you need to sign up for their mailing lists and attend a couple of their meetings. http://chennailug.org/.
They have a simple yardstick for recruiting people - BE/MCA 65% with no arrears. They are less concerned about if a guy is passionate about his job or not. I agree, one of the O’Reilly authors I worked with and prolific open source contributor, had a degree in Chinese literature. I notice that a very large percentage of open source hackers tend to have non-engineering degrees, or no degrees at all. Meritocracy and India - somehow they don’t seem to go together. And we are not talking about Govt here, it is the private companies with the so-called cream.
We’d rather talk about Mani Ratnam’s GURU, gossip about Surya-Jothika and be happy Many nerds in the US actually sleep near the theatre to get tickets for movies like Star Wars. The average Slashdotter is also obsessed with a certain Natalie Portman
Remember, it’s open source/free software. There is no one stopping you from contributing.
July 29th, 2006 at 1:15 pm
They say: “Find a job that you love and you dont have to work a single day”.
welcome to the what am i doing here club mate
February 25th, 2007 at 7:29 am
PK’s views on Cyber Coolies…..
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