I do not have a particularly precious and intimate experience with software development at scale, let alone the influential and effective trends permeating through the medium. I do know, however, that the greatest works in human history are products of exhaustive collaboration and the free flow of information. It is in the intersection of passion and curiosity, with a desire to create something for humanity that true ingenuity blossoms. This is no secret, every scientist and academic and proper leader is cognizant of this fact. The question at hand of greater importance is what the result being sought after is, in truth. Particularly, what do we want to create? Who will benefit from it? Why do we make it?
That is where the cathedral and the bazaar offer incredibly differing goals. The wizards lurking the pristine, tainted crystal walls of the cathedral are more than aware that they are not the best-fit in the entire field of software development, omnisciently handpicked for their sacred mission. The more intelligent one is, the more one holds their limitations in mind. Nevertheless, they are not seeking to make the best thing that can possibly come to be, but to strive for something that is good enough in such a way that their task is fulfilled discretely. Because, in the end, it is their job. Jobs depend on results, not processes. Jobs conflict interests, jobs force one to keep secrets. It may very well simultaneously be that the job is the wizards’ passions, yet the shackles of employment one ties around one’s neck will stifle creativity and passion, even of the most well-intentioned and brilliant. This is not a matter of a personal fault, but the bureaucracy that governs success in software development has never prioritized intrinsic qualities over extrinsic ones. After all, the job of the cathedral is to make money, not to make a good thing. If in the divine quest for the former they happen to stumble onto the second one, then that may be cause to celebrate. Yet, how else can one uphold these holy, intricate crystals? There is a grave weight above, that cares not for the intentions of the walls, but demands the ceiling not come crashing down.
The bazaar has no ceiling overseeing its results. The sky shines through. The bazaar is typically not in the business of secrecy, nor of pride. People wander in and out, at their leisure. More often than not, the bazaar wants to make a good thing, achievable only with collaboration. Grass litters the ground, roots not with much depth but with great determination which feed on clean, donated water. Most plants do not stand to do much on their lonesome, but when together they make for a pretty forest. A handful of trees sprout, and take hold of the market’s frame. Their bark is rough, and the labor of many, but stands humbly with strength.
While the cathedral and the bazaar offer extremes on a model that, for praxis, must lie somewhere in the middle, they also offer idealistic contrast. They may at a glance materially create similar outputs, but the intention behind them and their eventual usage will be much contrasting. Any group can, with the right knowledge and resources, make nigh anything in such a powerful medium such as computation. Wisdom will be what dictates why they do the things they do.