Introduction
Community spirit
Libre, Open Source software thrives on community spirit, mutual help, and above all, on contributions from the whole community.
There are two complementary aspects: the personal one and the collective one. On the personal level are the personal liberties guaranteed by the licences the software is released under. We are free to use it as we please, hack it as we please, redistribute it as we please, etc. This obviously appeals to our selfish, ego-centric nature. But this is complemented and tempered by the collective nature of Open Source software. We all rely on the work done by other people. Open Source software can only thrive if we nurture a strong community spirit, the notions of sharing, participating, cooperating, so that the fruit of our collective work can shine.
