Openness: Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

Openness is related to Open Source and is a philosophy that is being used as the basis of how various groups and organizations operate. It is a relatively new term to describe this general way of doing things.

It is typified by communal management, and open access to the information or material resources for projects; openness to contributions from a diverse range of users/producers, flat hierarchies, and a fluid organisational structure.

Communal management is usually done with decisions being made by some form of consensus decision-making or voting.

It is now being put forward to facilitate the growth of the Open Source and Freeware programming communities. As well as others, particularly activist groups.

Wikipedia and its related sites are examples of openness in the web environment.