Today, for the first time in the history in the Open Source Hardware Certification Program, OSHWA is revoking the certification for hardware.  OSHWA is revoking the certification for the MOTEDIS XYZ 3D printer, with the UID ES000001, because the documentation is no longer publicly available.  We have attempted to contact Motedis with a request to re-post the documentation but they have not been responsive.

Since this is the first time OSHWA has revoked a certification, we want to explain what happened, as well as what we will do in order to help prevent this type of situation in the future.

What happened

A few weeks ago, a community member wrote in and noted that the documentation link for the XYZ was no longer live.  After reaching out to the contact person listed in the certification application, we have been unable to obtain a copy of the documentation to post publicly.   Without the documentation, the XYZ is no longer in compliance with the program. Therefore OSWHA revoked the certification.

What it means

Revoking the certification means that going forward the XYZ can no longer be advertised as being certified open source hardware.  It does not mean that Motedis’ failure to provide documentation today makes them retroactively in violation of the certification rules.  The certification requires that the documentation be available at the time of certification. It does not require the certifying party to commit to making a copy of that documentation available in perpetuity.  This is a burden that is unreasonable to expect of a party applying for certification.

What now

When the Certification program was being developed, there was a debate over whether or not OSHWA should try and host a repository of all of the certified hardware.  One advantage of such a centralized repository would have been to allow OSHWA itself to maintain archive copies of documentation.

However, that approach also comes with costs.  Developing and maintaining a feature-complete documentation hosting solution is beyond OSHWA’s core competency.  Many good solutions for developing and maintaining software and documentation already exist online. Requiring certifiers to update and maintain yet another repository of documentation in order to certify was determined to be unnecessarily burdensome.  Instead, the certification directory supports links which point to the place where the developers already host and maintain their documentation.

OSHWA continues to believe that this decentralized approach is correct.  Nonetheless, the first revocation of certification provides us with an opportunity to consider improvements.  OSHWA has started to investigate a process that would allow us to archive a version of all documentation. This archive would not be used at the primary documentation storage location.  Instead, it would only be used in the event that the original documentation was no longer available. That would allow users of hardware to access documentation even after the responsible party stops supporting it as open.

If you have thoughts about this, please let us know in the forums.

We at OSHWA are excited to announce that the OSHWA Certification process has an officially registered trademark. This registration will make it easier for OSHWA to prevent people from using the OSHWA Open Source Hardware Certification logo if they have not actually gone through the certification process. We hope this will give the community more confidence when they see the OSHWA certification logo on hardware out in the world.

While there are many good faith ways to describe something as “open source hardware,” OSHWA considers certified projects to have met the gold standard of open source hardware by formally committing to comply with all of the elements of the community definition.

Are Trademarks Compatible with Open Source Hardware?

Trademarks are not in conflict with open source hardware. Trademarks are designed to indicate the origins of goods, not to control their reproduction. Knowing who produced something is especially important with hardware, because who actually manufactured hardware can be just as important to its reliability as who designed it.

Trademarks also do not prevent someone else from building on or using hardware that is protected by the mark. Companies like Lulzbot, Evil Mad Scientist, Adafruit, and Sparkfun all make open source hardware that anyone can copy, improve, or build upon. What people cannot do is pretend that their version of the hardware came from one of those companies by selling their version under the brand name of the original creator. That makes sense, because the original creator is no longer responsible for the new versions.

When creators have invited the world to make use of their open hardware, trademarks are how we know which pieces of hardware still come from the original designer. OSHWA believe that strong brand identities are compatible with a vibrant open source hardware ecosystem.

What OSHWA’s Trademark Means

The OSHWA Open Source Hardware Certification process is designed to make it easy for end users to quickly tell if their hardware meets the community definition of Open Source Hardware.  When you see the OSHWA certification logo, you know what “open source hardware” really means.

The trademark will allow us to control how people use the certification logo out in the world. In concrete terms, it means that someone who fraudulently uses the OSHWA certification logo on hardware that does not meet the community definition is infringing on the OSHWA trademark.  That means that OSHWA could bring a trademark infringement action against that person. This will allow OSHWA to protect the integrity of the certification mark.

What  OSHWA’s Trademark Doesn’t Mean

As we noted in a post at the outset of the certification development process, OSHWA has no interest in controlling, nor ability to control, who gets to use the term “open source hardware.”  Similarly, OSHWA does not have, nor desire, any control over who gets to use the Gear Logo and when they get to use it. Open Source Hardware is a concept that was developed by the community and continues to evolve as the community evolves.

Instead, OSHWA’s trademark will allow OSHWA to control the OSHWA-specific certification process.  If the community definition of open source hardware is important to you, the OSHWA certification logo will be an easy way to know that the hardware you are holding matches that definition.

What is Next?

We are getting excited to launch version 2.0 of the certification process at the Summit this September.  One of the big goals of 2.0 is to make it even easier to understand how licensing works with open source hardware, and make it easy to explore hardware that has already been certified.  If you are at the Summit you will be able to see that launch in person. If you can’t make it, keep an eye on this space for updates.

Also, a huge thank you to the students of the Juelsgaard Intellectual Property and Innovation Clinic at Stanford University Law School for guiding OSHWA through the registration process.

Thoughts?  Questions? You can always find OSHWA on Twitter, Facebook, and in the forums.

After almost a year and a half of community discussion, OSHWA unveiled the Open Source Hardware Certification Program at the 2016 Open Hardware Summit.  Today, with the help of a major grant from the Sloan Foundation, we are excited to announce that we are taking major steps towards Certification 2.0.

The original certification program has some fairly straightforward goals.  It is designed to make it easy for creators to identify their hardware as compliant with the community definition of open source hardware, as well as make it easy for users to know that hardware that is advertised as “open source” meets  their expectations.  The certification process gives a creator confidence that they have done everything required to call their hardware open source.  The certification logo gives users confidence that they will be able to access, build upon, and hack any hardware that they receive.

We didn’t know what to expect when we launched the certification program and have been blown away by the results.  There are currently 170 certified hardware projects from 18 countries on 5 continents participating in the program.

While we are excited about the certification program, shortly after it launched we started thinking of ways to improve it.  The current interface built on a combination of google forms and wordpress is functional, but not necessarily elegant.  Once the process was live, we also started getting feedback from users on ways to make it better.  One major concern was that the registration process exists in a bit of a vacuum.  It asks the creator to verify that she has complied with all of the requirements but does not provide very much guidance on the best ways to comply or the various choices that can be made and still comply.

For the past year we have been working with the Technology Law and Policy Clinic at the New York University School of Law to create more robust guidance to help creators navigate the licensing, documentation, and other decisions that creators must make when they are working towards certification.  We have also been working with the team at Objectively to turn that guidance into an interactive process that draws on examples from the community.

The grant from the Sloan Foundation allows us to take that work and turn the certification into a much more robust and useful resource.  We are hoping to have the new site ready to launch by the 2018 Summit.  Until then, please let us know if you have thoughts, ideas, or concerns.  We are very excited about the next chapter of the Certification Program and hope you will be too.

Hello to the new board members, Akiba, Arielle, and David, joining the OSHWA team!

Each board member will be helping the organization continue to grow through contributions drawn from an amazing array of backgrounds and experiences in hackerspaces, makerspaces, academics, OSHW businesses, government relations, and much more!

We also thank the board members stepping down, Jeff, Joel, and Katherine, for contributing their time and experience to steer the organization and influence the open source hardware community as a whole. We appreciate the efforts everyone has put and will put into The Open Source Hardware Association!

Akiba

Akiba has been designing open source hardware for the past ten years and has run an open source hardware company for the same amount of time. I’ve put together or have been involved putting together four hackerspaces (Tokyo Hackerspace, Mothership Hackermoms, Knowledge Garden Dharamsala, and HackerFarm) and understand the importance of building, maintaining, and growing community.

Arielle Hein

Arielle is a graduate studies alumni of ITP NYU and has worked extensively with Open Source Hardware consistently since then. In her current role as an Instructor at the University of Colorado, she teaches interaction design and physical computing courses that rely heavily on open source tools. She also offers extensive community organizing experience through ongoing work as the Coordinator of ITP Camp.

David Li

David has been an open source and free software contributor since 1990 on various of projects. Ardublock, developed in 2012, is one of the most popular graphical development environments for Arduino. His experiences include research in the area of open hardware ecosystem in China since 2011, director of the ObjectWeb (a European based open source software consortium) in 2003-2006, and has contributed to the joint effort between ObjectWeb and major Chinese open source software projects.

Become an OSHWA member today to vote on nominees!

This year, we have 3 open seats on the OSHWA board. Board members will hold a 2-year position. Once board members have been chosen by the community, the board will appoint a President, VP, and Secretary. As every nominee answered “Yes” to having 5 hours a month to give to the board, we did not include that question in each nominee’s data. Board responsibilities include fundraising, advising on goals and direction, and carrying out compliance of the organization’s purposes and bylaws. The vote will be open on Oct. 14th through Oct 21st. Members will be emailed a link to vote. Here are the nominees in alphabetical order:

Akiba

Why do you want to be on the board?

I’ve been involved and worked with many nonprofits and NGOs doing projects like monitoring illegal waste dumping, monitoring water quality in the Himalayas, radiation monitoring in Japan, etc. All of those projects have used open source hardware in some form because the designs could be rapidly put together, deployed, and assessed. Crises are becoming the norm and I believe open source hardware will play a crucial role to prevent, mitigate, or assist aid workers and victims during those times. I’d like to give back to the open source hardware community for all the benefits I’ve received as well as help guide OSHW and OSHWA towards more cooperation with nonprofit humanitarian and aid agencies.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I’ve been designing open source hardware for the past ten years and have run an open source hardware company for the same amount of time. I think it’s important for OSHWA board members to understand the value of OSHW and how that translates into commercial value for their companies. I’ve put together or have been involved putting together four hackerspaces (Tokyo Hackerspace, Mothership Hackermoms, Knowledge Garden Dharamsala, and HackerFarm) and understand the importance of building, maintaining, and growing community. I’ve also worked with, consulted, and put together open hardware projects for groups like UNESCO, World Bank, and IAEA and believe that it’s important to reach out and educate NGOs doing important work to the benefits of open source hardware.

Will Caruana

Why do you want to be on the board?

I want to be part of something bigger then my self. I feel that I will add an outside perspective. I don’t work in any industry that produces goods but I live in that maker space of the communitte.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I served as president of a non profit for 5 years it’s the Friends of Wilbraham Public Access. I was the chairmen if the Board Band Committee which was able to set up a municipal corporation that sell fiber optic services to ISP’s. I also love make things currently I like making high voltage projects like my demo fusion reactor which currently produces a ball of plasma in a vacuum. I am also running the fun with high voltage workshop at the Hackaday Superconference because I like helping people learn and work with high voltage.

Arielle Hein

Why do you want to be on the board?

I work and engage with a vastly diverse range of different communities, but one of the primary overlaps between these groups is that they all rely heavily on open source tools, hardware in particular. I am extremely passionate about building bridges between the arts and engineering, and making this cross-disciplinary work more accessible to a broad range of makers – to artists and women especially. I love to create, hack, and teach all things open source – but as much as I’m excited about exploring emerging technologies, the thing that drives me most is the way that sharing knowledge is an opportunity to build connections between people. I am excited about the prospect of more direct engagement within the Open Source Hardware community, and eager to assist in continuing to extend the mission of this organization.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

Since my time as a graduate student at ITP NYU, I have worked extensively with Open Source Hardware and have engaged with the community consistently since then. In my current role as an Instructor at the University of Colorado, I teach interaction design and physical computing courses that rely heavily on open source tools. Beyond skill acquisition, my philosophy as an educator focuses on the importance of knowledge sharing, documentation, and collaboration – notions that I will bring to my contributions on the board of OSHWA. I also have extensive community organizing experience through my ongoing work as the Coordinator of ITP Camp. I am a strong communicator (and listener!) and very organized and responsive in all correspondence. I am extremely excited about the opportunity to serve not he OSHWA board and am hopeful to deepen my contributions within this community. I am glad to answer any questions via email from anyone in the community regarding my qualifications or interest in this role!

David Li

Why do you want to be on the board?

I am currently the executive director of Shenzhen Open Innovation Lab which is a government supported platform to promote and facilitate the collaboration between the Shenzhen open hardware ecosystem and the global makers and open source hardware groups. Prior to SZOIL, I also started the research hub Hacked Matter with two collaborators to study global maker movement and open hardware ecosystem in Shenzhen and publish our findings. Shenzhen open hardware ecosystem is currently a 100 billion industry and the insight into how this ecosystem was developed and structured could contribute the future growth of the global open source hardware development.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I have been an open source and free software contributor since 1990 on various of projects. Ardublock I developed in 2012 is one of the most popular graphical development environments for Arduino. I have been doing research in the area of open hardware ecosystem in China since 2011. In my previous role as the director of ObjectWeb an European based open source software consortium in 2003-2006, I contributed to the joint effort between ObjectWeb and major Chinese open source software projects. I can bring new insights to the board and help bridge the global open hardware and the open ecosystem in China.

Narcisse Mbunzama

Why do you want to be on the board?

I want to bring my experience and knowledge on open hardware and related issues with a special view on technical and organizations development. As a citizen of the democratic republic of Congo, I wish to represent the global south in the board, to bring valuable contribution and inputs finally to help achieve the open hardware association mission.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I hold a master degree in computer science and technology innovation and I am a fellow of the international telecommunication union and member of several technology innovation organizations around the world. I’m a serial award winning tech innovator and I conduct researches on standards for open hardware, design of system and related issues. With my background and experience, I personally believe that I am a qualified candidate to join the board and i will bring valuable inputs and contribution in the board.

Joel Murphy

Chris Osterwood

Why do you want to be on the board?

I am a longtime user of Open Source Hardware and have benefited from it greatly. I want to return that favor and help others benefit from OSHW. I’m a mechanical engineer by training and I chose that educational path because I was fascinated and captivated by the mechanical world. I gained tremendous design insight and experience by taking apart my toys as a child — in fact my favorite store sold broken junk by the pound. Being able to see how my toys worked gave me interest in designing new products. Since college, I’ve learned electrical design through study of open source hardware schematics, bills of materials, and design journals. I now see that I’m repeating my childhood but in digital circuit design — learning new skills and design strategies by interrogating what others have made. And without OSHW, without published schematics, this kind of interrogation and subsequent learning is much more difficult. What I’ve learned has allowed me to start my own company, Capable Robot Components, which will be releasing a line of OSHW products aimed at changing the make vs buy decisions that makers of unmanned ground robots currently face. I want to be on the OSHWA board to further its mission and to help others benefit from OSHW as I have.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I’m not sure quite how to answer this question. But, I understand and am interested in organization building — for example I’m on the steering committee of the Pittsburgh Robotics Network, which is becoming a 501c6 organization. I am embracing OSHW with the products I’m designing at my company. I have functional knowledge in hardware design, embedded software, web software, marketing, and law. I enjoy teaching and speaking — I’ve given talks on law & robots (Practicing Law Institute) and how we tested 3D sensors at my previous company (Embedded Vision Summit and ROSCON). I listen. I try to make well reasoned decisions.

Jeff Paranich

Why do you want to be on the board?

My low-level coding interests for the past 20 years have led me to hardware design, and the colossal reward of holding a tangible, physical item, in your hands that can be shared with others to extend upon and use in their designs. While programming low-level in itself is still fulfilling, the thought that everyday consumers can build their own commercial grade products with all the distributor resources available today is truly phenomenal. Curiously, the knowledge that such a movement exist is not known by the general population. One simply envisions big factories, assembly lines, and blue-chip organizations being the sole innovator and originator; when in reality there are compelling and pioneering designs being done by small organizations and private individuals in their own homes. I believe this is a tragic mindset; the homebrew and maker community was strong in the eighties, there was a general knowledge it existed by all and anticipation of an upcoming wave to pave the future to new technology. I can attest that today open hardware has, and will continue to gain, a lot of momentum – and is strongest it has been in two decades – but may continue to be eclipsed by large organizations that keep much of their business proprietary. Canada, my home country, has a very strong post-secondary system; world-class Computer Science and Engineering schools, however outside of BioWare and BlackBerry there has not been much traction in STEM corporations, small business’, nor makers in the nation, I believe due in part to organizations such as OSHWA not having a strong enough presence to inform and encourage innovation and open source/hardware from early on and to general masses. Thus, I desire to be on the board to expand awareness of the Open Source Hardware Association and inform and educate those who are not aware of what it represents. I pledge to attend fairs or events, fundraise well beyond the expected $300 as it is not enough, and provide meaningful input on the Board of Director meetings. I also believe the best protection for OSHWA’s future is committing resources to youth at early ages, expanding their mind into hardware before they move onto post-secondary or private studies – even presenting hardware as a valid field of self-study that can merit much personal success with all the open source resources available today. OSHWA is the strongest association and best bet right now to incite change, grow the movement further, and ensure the hardware community story remains a rich and colorful one. It would be an absolute honor to be part of the team and ensure its continued success.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I hold dual degrees from the University of Alberta- Bachelor of Science in Computer Science & Bachelor of Science in Actuarial Mathematics, with a minor in Business. I have been a projects controls manager for over two billion dollars in heavy oil projects; managing revenue, cost, margins, scheduling and progress completion. When I am not managing projects, I am designing hardware in my workshop. My most common projects typically involve power supplies, FPGA boards, video processing ADC/DAC boards, and audio amplifiers. Furthermore, I have coded a multitude of company software programs – software as simple as employee in/out of office interfaces, to estimating software for piping fabrication, to invoicing software which neared that of a full ERP system. I have a thorough knowledge of C++, C and the Unix tool set (Awk, Sed, etc), and believe in the Unix philosophy of building simple, short, clear, modular, and extensible code that can be easily maintained and repurposed by developer’s other than its creators. I can operate under tight deadlines and sometimes unrealistic deliverables, accepting the challenge and looking forward to the feeling of reward once finished. Lastly, I am co-founder of a successful videography company in Alberta (J&C Media Corporation), managing employees and finances and scheduling – also doing occasional filming myself in the field for corporate and private events. All said my past is very multi-faceted, I have a multitude of exposure to many elements at various business levels and have been successful to date with a clear, structured framework to how I approach things and would apply all my techniques to ensure the continued success of the Open Source Hardware Association.

Nick Poole

Why do you want to be on the board?

I’ve always been a proponent of OSHW and other Free and Open initiatives and I believe I finally have the free time and bandwidth to get involved with steering the ship. I’m also interested in talking to other board members and learning from their perspectives.

What qualifies you to be a board member?

I’ve worked for SparkFun Electronics for almost 7 years where I’ve had the opportunity to see open hardware from a number of perspectives: as a marketing professional, a community discussion leader, and a designer and maintainer of open hardware projects. I believe that my work experience combined with my unique personal perspective and affinity for facilitating and mediating discussions could make me a valuable member of the board.

OSHWA is looking for 3 new faces to join the board of directors for the Open Source Hardware Association. The nominee form is for self-nominations only. Please fill out the nominee form (deactivated October 14) to become a nominee or forward the link to someone you want to nominate. Do not fill out the form for someone else. The purpose of this form is to tell voting members why you want to serve on the OSHWA board. We will be publish the nominees and their answers on Oct. 14th. Board members hold a 2-year position. Once board members have been chosen by the community, the board will appoint a President, VP, and Secretary. Board responsibilities include fundraising, advising on goals and direction, and carry out compliance with the organizations purposes and bylaws. See the board member agreement to get a sense of the responsibilities. Board members are expected to adhere to the board attendance policy and come prepared having read the board packet. Board members are expected to spend 5-10 hours of time per month on OSHWA. Nominees can meet current board members who are present at the Summit on Oct. 5th to ask questions or submit questions to info@oshwa.org. Nominations will be open until Oct. 12th.

Member voting will take place Oct. 14-21. Want to vote in the election? Become a member! Please note that only individuals can vote, corporate members cannot.

We are only a few months out from this years OHSummit! This year we will be hosting the annual gathering in the Rocky Mountain region in beautiful Denver, Colorado. Denver is home to several startups and projects built around the open source ethos with a thriving community to support the movement. If you are interested in finding out more about some of the local open source culture, be sure to check out the new events page here!

We are excited to announce that ART Hotel, adjacent to this year’s venue, is working with us to provide discounted rates for their rooms! Find out more information here.

Don’t forget there are still tickets and sponsorship places available as well!

Hope to see everyone in Denver!

Open Source Stories invited  Alicia Gibb,  Executive Director of the Open Source Hardware Association to give a keynote presentation at the Red Hat Summit in Boston last week.

Gibb’s talk was entitled ‘The Physical Future of Open Source’. The talk was a primer on Open Source Hardware and the future possibilities of communities working together. In her talk, she said: “The more we band together, the more the world becomes open source. If we dream of an Open source world, the world includes physical products. We need to be thinking more holistically. ”

“For this open source future to happen, combining open software and open hardware, we need help from all communities asking themselves is there an open source alternative out there? when wen working on projects”, said Gibb.

Gibb talked about “atoms vs. bits” and the difference included in source from hardware to software: “Currently the open source hardware community doesn’t include the atomic layer in their source, for example where the copper comes from. When we talk about the source of hardware, we suspend reality a bit to include the important parts of the source to recreate the hardware, but raw materials are not considered something worth listing by the open hardware community at this point.”

She spoke about the future of open source hardware. “With more research, 3D printers could print entire components, or turn into desktop chip fabs – if people can create chips at home, they will share files and the IC industry will need to open source chips to stay relevant, whereas currently almost all ICs are closed.”

OSHWA is grateful for the opportunity to spread the word that open source hardware has a definition, a certification mark, and open hardware options exist in the world.