Open Source is four kinds of economic goods

The useful part

Its code, infrastructure, services, maintainer time, and commercial ecosystem each behave differently. Treating all of them as a single commons hides who pays today, who controls access, and who needs to pay. The second is rivalry: whether one person's use leaves less for everyone else.

How it works

• A sandwich is a simple example: the shop can choose whether to sell it to me (excludable), but once I eat it, nobody else can (rival).

Example or evidence

• An Open Source project contains several economic goods.

Details worth keeping

Economists often classify goods along two dimensions. Combining those dimensions produces four kinds of goods. Excludable Non-excludable Rival Private goods Sandwiches Common-pool resources Fish in the ocean Non-rival Toll goods Toll roads, until they reach capacity Public goods Weather forecasts A private good is both excludable and rival.