Constructing meaning from coincidence
12/30/2011@17:03:40
People often look at me funny when I say that years from now we'll look back on the development of github and its influence on open source software as a watershed event. As I've continued to interact with people on github, I now see this as what I call the github paradox.
Put simply, the github paradox refers to the fact that it's now easier to collaborate with strangers across disparate time and geographical boundaries without regard to education, national origin, race, religion, or sex, than it is to collaborate with friends in person.
Where github tilts the scales in encouraging collaboration is the fact that the friend across the room may not have the experience, interest, or perspective to be an effective collaborator, whereas there's a kind of natural selection going on with a social site such as github. Whether that decreasing Venn diagram intersection can be made to work for interdisciplinary collaboration is another question entirely - one can only hope.
The integration of the entire process of introducing change via a web-based github pull request into a globally shared piece of software is a model that has forever changed just about anything that can be done via text. The fact that github pull requests do this in a way that is discrete, immediately comprehensible, reviewed broadly, supported or denied, and logged is just icing on the cake.
That is a game-changer, whether we realize it or not.
My name is David Watson. I'm a creative person from a small town in Western Pennsylvania called Fallston. I went to school in the Beaver and New Brighton school districts before graduating from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh.
I met my wife, Wendy teaching at Mars High School where I taught the drum line and she taught the color guard. After graduation, we lived in Boston and Seattle before returning to the Pittsburgh area, where I earn my living making software.
This site chronicles my ideas, photographs, music, and technology. I hope you find something of value here. If you'd like to collaborate, please contact me on Linked In or at the email address above. Thanks for visiting!