The Open Source Initiative was founded in 1998 by some of the same people who had started the Open Source movement a little beforehand. It quickly established itself as the nexus for reviewing new licenses and identifying the ones that satisfied the Open Source Definition. This role standardising licenses proved to be the crucial catalyst that converted the pre-existing free software movement from academia to global corporate adoption.

In this talk we will consider:

• Briefly, a timeline of the Open Source movement
• How the license review process works and OSI's role as "Speaker of the House" rather than as "Supreme Dictator".
• The new membership system and why your project should become an Affiliate
• Some of the new working groups and activities

OSI is newly revitalised and relevant - this talk is your gateway to understanding how and why.