Apache Software Foundation Turns 10. Happy B’day! What next?

The Apache Software Foundation (ASF) – developers, stewards, and incubators of leading community-driven Open Source projects – announced its tenth anniversary at ApacheCon. Evolving from eight developers known as “the Apache Group” who created enhancements and managed the development of the original Apache Web server, The ASF today comprises nearly 300 individual Members and over 2,000 Committers collaborating across six continents through The ASF’s successful meritocratic process known as “The Apache Way.”

The Foundation supports the incubation and development of enterprise-grade, freely available software while minimizing potential legal exposure of intellectual property and financial contributions. Apache products benefit millions of Internet users worldwide, with thousands of software solutions available under the popular Apache License distributed in both Open Source and proprietary products.

The ASF footprint continues to grow, helping the global Open Source community at-large through thousands of bug fixes and lines of code, hundreds of developer, user, and issue tracking mailing lists, as well as numerous community outreach and mentoring initiatives, such as the Google Summer of Code and Highly Open Participation Contest.

The Foundation’s day-to-day operating expenses are offset by individual donations and corporate sponsors at various levels of contribution. They include, at the Platinum level: Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo!; at the Gold level: Hewlett-Packard; at the Silver level: Progress Software and SpringSource; and at the Bronze level: AirPlus International, Joost, Matt Mullenweg, Tetsuya Kitahata, and Two Sigma Investments.

The Apache Software Foundation – http://www.apache.org/

10th b’day is a good time to reassess the position of the foundation. What do you think should be the the ASF’s role in shaping the future of open source software?