Research Paper Vote

[Deaflamb]

I'm taking a research writing class at my local community college. As part of this class I must do a 10 page term paper on any topic of my desire. The topic I have chosen is:
Open Source Development compared to Closed Source Development and how it relates to Security

Now I know from looking into this, and just previous knowledge that there is no clear cut decison on this topic. But for my paper I must pick a side and defend it to the death. So I figured, being that I can support either side, I would put it to a vote.

So Let me know what u think, Closed or Open source... which is the leader when it comes to security.

Along with your vote, if you know of any especially good palces to look for info relating to this topic, drop in a link.

Thanks for your time.

DeafLamb

[rapier57]

You think ten pages is enough to cover this topic adequately? There is a lot of current information and discussion on this.

There are some current articles in:

http://www.eweek.com/
http://www.infoworld.com/

and other locations. There have also been a number of recent commentaries about the lack of coherent argument in defense of open source. You'll need to Google around a bit for some of those.

I have my own feelings on the subject, but only hard experience to back them up.

If you want to go deeper into this, ping me offline.

[lumpyporridge]

http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/
http://www.opensource.org/
http://www.fsf.org/
http://www.oreilly.com/openbook/freedom/

[Deaflamb]

Thanks for the replies so far. But no one has actually give a vote. Thanks for the time though, and I'll deffinitly check out those links.

DeafLamb

[noODle]

One of the links that lumpyporridge put up was a great link.

The Cathedral and the Bazaar
http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue3_3/raymond/
It does not focus on security but on 'open source versus closed source ' in general.
It is a great resource.
There is also: The hacker ethic and the spirit of the information age
<CnP from a previous post>
Title: The hacker ethic and the spirit of the information age
Author: Pekka Himanen
Site: http://www.hackerethic.org/

Here, the word hacker doesn't refer to computer criminals but what the word originally meant: a person who wants to do something that one is passionate about, something in which one can realize oneself creatively, and something in which one can build things for the good of all. The hacker ethic is a new work ethic questioning the old Protestant ethic.

Perhaps that can help you out with your paper.

Cheers
noODle