Ideas for a dissertation on Ubuntu/ Open source?

[thedon_1]

I'm going to be entering my final year in University later this year and so i am now in the planning stages of writing my dissertation.

I am studying finance and accounting and thought maybe something to do with Ubuntu/Linux or Open source software would be interesting to write about.

I am having trouble thinking of possible subject titles. The only solid idea i have is maybe something about how open source software can make money.

Any ideas?

[M_the_C]

I don't know whether it's a good idea, but could you do your dissertation on developers, and the various ways they finance their projects to keep them running? You could compare single developers to large groups such as Ubuntu.

[az]

I'm going to be entering my final year in University later this year and so i am now in the planning stages of writing my dissertation.

I am studying finance and accounting and thought maybe something to do with Ubuntu/Linux or Open source software would be interesting to write about.

I am having trouble thinking of possible subject titles. The only solid idea i have is maybe something about how open source software can make money.

Any ideas?

http://www.dwheeler.com/oss_fs_why.html
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/ict/policy/doc/2006-11-20-flossimpact.pdf

[aeiah]

http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?no_d2=1&sid=08/04/21/1534222

perhaps you could look into this side of things too

[Joeb454]

It might be good to mention the fact that some people argue OSS costs $60 billion a year to software companies (apparently :p) And give some sort of analysis on that?

[PartisanEntity]

You could write on how open source helps maximise the gains for tax payers.
How open source can make government more transparent.
How open source can help lower income families, and that perhaps it might be good for ministries to push open source.

Hope these ideas help

[az]

It might be good to mention the fact that some people argue OSS costs $60 billion a year to software companies (apparently :p) And give some sort of analysis on that?

What's the difference between costing a company 60 Billion and saving the consumer 60 Billion?

[Joeb454]

Exactly.

I'm not sure of the exact link, but I know I read something about it on Slashdot the other day :) I was talking to a friend about it earlier, we were trying to figure out quite how that actually worked :p

[JohnSearle]

Exactly.

I'm not sure of the exact link, but I know I read something about it on Slashdot the other day :) I was talking to a friend about it earlier, we were trying to figure out quite how that actually worked :p


http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/21/1534222

[Joeb454]

If the thanks feature was up and running I'd use it :)

[thedon_1]

Thanks guys for posting, all the posts have been a real help.

Really appreciate you taking the time out to reply.