The company not only uses open source, but has itself published numerous open source projects such as React and PyTorch.
The Linux Foundation welcomes Facebook as its newest member Platinum Member. However, the company is not brand new as its open source group has been a gold member for some time. The highest level carries a seat on the foundation’s board of directors, held by Facebook’s head of open source, Kathy Kam.
Facebook is the fifteenth platinum member of the Linux Foundation alongside AT& T, Fujitsu, Google, Hitachi, Huawei, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NEC, Oracle, Qualcomm, Samsung, Tencent and VMware. Kam thus meets well-known companies there, as she previously worked for five years at Google and twelve at Microsoft, where she had close ties to the developer community for Android and Windows respectively.
The two faces of Facebook
Public perception of Facebook is quite divided: On the one hand, the company stands out because of the unrestricted collection and use of data, which it also does not protect well enough, and the handling of political False statements and hate speech are regularly criticized. On the other hand, like Google, IBM or Microsoft, it is involved in numerous open source projects, which the developer community appreciates.
The most well-known projects include the JavaScript library React and that Cross-platform framework React Native and the machine learning framework PyTorch as a challenger to the Google-driven and also open-source TensorFlow. Facebook also founded the Open Compute Project, which transfers the open source approach to the hardware world.
Facebook is also involved in a number of projects under the Linux Foundation, including Presto, GraphQL and the ML exchange format ONNX.
Open data
As further projects, the article highlights a data set for unmasking deepfakes and the associated deepfake detection challenge as well as the Data for Good program in the fight against Covid-19.
Facebook, like all other major companies, uses and publishes open source projects because it apparently believes that this type of software development is of the greatest benefit to everyone, including the company itself. According to the Linux Foundation’s blog post on becoming a platinum member, Facebook has already invested millions of dollars in open source development.
