OpenUK reposted this
I’ll be honest — open source wasn’t always something I paid attention to. I had heard the term, seen it around. Still, it didn’t really click… until I attended a session by Open Source Kigali and OpenUK hosted by Didas Mbarushimana, and we listened to Professor Amanda Brock break it down at the Digital Transformation Center Rwanda a month ago. As I got deeper into my IBM Data Science learning path, and things started to connect — Git, GitHub, version control, collaboration… not just as tools, but as a mindset. And that’s when it hit me: Open source is not just about code. It’s about contribution. It’s people, from different parts of the world, building together — not for individual gain alone, but for something bigger. A shared infrastructure for progress. Yes, there are rules. Licenses. Governance. Structure. But at its core, it’s still one of the most powerful examples of what happens when technology becomes communal. The more people contribute, the better it becomes. The more useful it becomes. The more accessible it becomes. And if you think about it… That’s where real innovation lives. So today, I have a deeper respect for everyone building in the open. Everyone is contributing quietly. Everyone is making technology easier, faster, and more inclusive. This journey is stretching me (I opened my first GitHub account last week). And for the first time, I’m not just observing the ecosystem… I’m beginning to understand how to contribute to it. Here’s to open-source builders. Here’s to shared progress. Here’s to the next 10 years of becoming.
