The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Linux Foundation recently announced the creation of the Academy Software Foundation (ASWF) ; described by that org as a ‘neutral’ space for artists, engineers and developers to share work and collaborate on projects, thereby increasing both the quality and quantity of open source tools.

So this year’s SIG roundtable was a panel that initiated a discussion around a similar possible entity for the games industry. The goal was to ask questions like…

• Is this a model that the game industry should look to following?
• What are the upsides and downsides of such an effort?
• What might the next steps be in seeing this model, or another, move forward to promote the benefits of Open Source to and/or within the game industry?

Panel members, there primarily to introduce their entities and then get the discussion going, were…

• Chris Aniszczyk, Vice President, Developer Relations, The Linux Foundation
• Stephen Jacobs, SIG Leadership, RIT Game Prof and  and Faculty Lead of RIT’s FOSS@MAGIC Initiative
• Ariel Manzur, SIG Leadership and co-founder, Godot Engine
• Todd Prives,  Founding Board Member of the ASWF and Product Manager, Media and Entertainment, Google Cloud Platform
• Ruth Suehle, SIG Leadership and Senior Community Outreach Manager, Red Hat (Red Hat is an ASWF member)

Jacobs introduced the SIG and the other members of the panel, who then each briefly introduced themselves and their interests in FOSS in the game industry in general and their interests in the topic in particular.

For the remaining 30 minutes of the roundtable, the 50 or so attendees of the session discussed the roles of FOSS in games overall, the challenges in moving Open Source forward in the industry and an interest in the possibility of a games industry focused foundation.

A number of attendees, the SIG leadership and Chris from the Linux Foundation kept the conversation going for almost 90 minutes after the formal session ended. The discussion there started an effort to add a one day mini-conference, “Open Source in Gaming” to this  coming August’s Open Source Summit, North America, a Linux Foundation annual conference.