Where are all the open source marketers?

Laura Ramsey brings up a very interesting point regarding marketing of Open Source products (projects, things, stuff). The funny thing for me while reading (and re-reading) the post is that I kept thinking, not of ‘Open Source’ marketing, as in the marketing of Open Source products, but as on Open Source Marketing’, as in marketing in an Open Source way.

I think the answer to her question lies in my initial understanding of what she was saying – the marketing of Open Source has to come from the community in an Open Source way. Everyone feels passionate of the Open Source project they are working on and of the products they use that come out of the Open Source community. Why can’t some of the evangelist-inclined folks in the Open Source community run their marketing (or whatever you want to call it) like any Open Source project? The enthusiasm is from within, and the knowledge, too.

In a way, that was where I was going with my marketing with Lifeblog – I was trying to get others to own the marketing of the product, on their terms, and also to find others who would act as multipliers and do the same for me. Isn’t this how Open Source works? Organically grows from unguided, collective interaction in the community to create a self-organized, complex, organism with a life and direction of its own?

Sure, I greased my efforts with some money and gadgets, but it wasn’t all that necessary, it just sped things up, facilitated us getting off the ground. And, even with me gone, it’s still happening on its own!

So, my answer to where are all the Open Source marketers is: they are sitting right next to you. Use the tools you know and love to conquer marketing on your own terms.

Link by way of Kathy Sierra: Laura’s Box of Chocolates.