It's hard to believe that we have passed the 13th anniversary of Linus Torvald's humble introduction of "just a hobby" Linux, first posted to the Web in October 1991. Torvald previewed the OS as a "Minix-lookalike" and designed for the days when "men were men and wrote their own device drivers."

Like a teenager Linux has come into its own, but its future still holds a fair amount of growing pains. While the open source community has created a vibrant and fast-growing ecosystem to support Linux, there is still much work to do.

As a venture capitalist I have the privilege of meeting regularly with entrepreneurs and I've seen firsthand the exciting rate of innovation and change occurring within the Linux ecosystem. Venture investment is flowing because smart, tireless, and innovative people are doing important work to build real businesses using Linux. As I see it, the ecosystem is now clearly composed of open source and "open but proprietary" businesses, both of which are valuable and interesting to customers, participants, and investors.

While great progress has been made in the areas of open source applications and services, the single largest threat to the open source community is Intellectual Property rights. The EU's recent initiative to permit software patents has reignited a significant and hotly contested debate. Closer to home, the United States Patent and Trademark Office is under fire for issuing patents that could stifle software development. What both sides of the debate can agree upon is that innovation comes in many forms and from all corners. Whether it's software, hardware, or any other type of advancement, one thing is certain - you cannot measure innovation solely by your throughput on patent filings. Patents are expensive and require tremendous legal expertise to file and defend. In a battle of legal and financial resources, the open source community is at a severe disadvantage compared to its corporate counterparts.

The challenge for the greater software community is to find new common ground. Since software patents (and attorneys) will not disappear overnight, the open source community must find a way to work with the commercial software vendors to address the IP issue. A new organization is needed to promote cross-licensing - either free or in some very simple and scalable fashion. Patent owners and software developers would forego costly legal entanglements and, in some cases, benefit economically from their inventions. A private nonprofit organization could serve in this important role.

Without a progressive cross-licensing effort, a cloud of uncertainty will likely hang indefinitely over open source software and limit its expansion. Let's not forget about the customers who are left to make sense of the debates. Unless there's a real effort to alter the status quo, current and potential customers will naturally be reluctant to adopt or accelerate the deployment of open source software into their mission-critical infrastructure.

Many in the community call for the elimination of patents or an overhaul of the patent system. While good arguments could be made for both, neither is going to happen quickly enough to address the short-term challenges. When I was at Microsoft, we coined a term "embrace and extend," which advocates embracing the existing reality and extending it in a way that is beneficial to all. The software community can do the same - embrace software patents and work to turn the current situation more favorably toward open source development and small software developers.

The open source community has come too far to retreat. That's why the time is right for innovation on the IP front. Addressing the IP issue will ultimately help reduce the confusion customers face when utilizing the different forms of open source-style licenses. GPL itself is 13 years old and needs to adapt to new customer requirements. Why not make 2005 the year that brings together the key parties to create a license framework that provides needed flexibility and also the structure necessary for customers (and developers) to easily maintain compliance?

With the right structure, the open source community would benefit from the safeguards of patent cross-licensing. Indemnification could be offered to enterprise customers. Developers would have a simple method of contributing code - either for free, or for a fee.

My New Year's resolution is to encourage both the open source community and the "open but proprietary" businesses to tackle the IP challenge head-on. Only then can the business and venture communities fully support the incredibly promising young individuals of Linux and open source.