Advantages of Open Source. Open source is promoted because of the following perceived advantages:

• Development can be done collaboratively across organizations and people without regard to concerns about who owns what.
• Compatibility issues can be addressed more directly, as interfaces, methods of operation and techniques are completely transparent.
• Errors can be identified and corrections proposed (and made) by anyone, as opposed to just the owner.
• Costs to users are naturally limited (and tending towards zero) as no developer can assert market power-based pricing on rights to intellectual property. However, in theory money can still be made based on services provided with respect to the products.

• There is no centralized control over the direction of development, and standards cannot be imposed, but have to evolved organically. Assurance of compatibility with third party products is less certain as there is not necessarily single "blessed" central standard.
• Ownership of improvements to open source software distributed to others reverts to the community at large, and so there can be an economic disincentive to invest in projects beyond the immediate need.
• There is no single person or entity to turn to in the event of errors or quality control issues, so use of open source requires personnel intimately familiar with the products

Variations of Open Source Licensing. Open source licensing has significant variations. Look at this website under Licenses for a discussion.