I’m headed off to the Cash Music Summit in Portland, OR today.

Here’s the blurb I wrote out for Jesse’s zine:

What’s open source got to do with it?

Free software sounds like a 70s era free-love pipe dream. The idea and a copyright hack to enable it were born in 1984, brought to term by an academic who just wanted to fix a problem he had with his printer.

Free and open source software underpin Cash Music’s platform. Why should that matter to you? Software developers prefer working with code they can freely read, understand and modify. But the benefits to end users are not always as clear.

There’s a method to the madness that is giving away something many believe is worth more if kept secret. It’s not just about sharing, but also accountability, choice and freedom. And, it’s about creating communities we love contributing to, with the kind of people we love to collaborate with.

I’m not sure exactly which story I’m going to tell today – I’ve got 10 minutes though and a pretty sweet picture of Tina Turner.

If you’ve not seen Cash Music or learned about it’s mission, check out this NYTimes article about their work.