The open source community has developed a number of tools and philosophies to assist in distributed software development. The Still Water Lab at the University of Maine believes that these tools and philosophies can be adapted to facilitate other forms of distributed creative endeavors. It has developed two tools that reinterpret the ideas used in open source software through the lenses of artistic creation and preservation: The Pool, and the Variable Media Questionnaire. This article discusses how several of the ideas used in software development have influenced Still Water's approach to making tools that support artistic production.

This article can be read in its entirety at http://thoughtmesh.net/publish/296.php.