by 1 Cylivers
Snapshot
The page may have changed since the time the snapshot was taken. [go to current page].
If you’ve been to a computer show in recent months you might have seen it: a shiny silver drink can with a ring-pull logo and the words “opencola” on the side. Inside is a fizzy drink that tastes very much like Coca-Cola. Or is it Pepsi?There’s something else written on the can, though, which sets the drink apart. It says “check out the source at opencola.com.” Go to that Web address and you’ll see something that’s not available on Coca-Cola’s website, or Pepsi’s — the recipe for cola. For the first time ever, you can make the real thing in your own home. OpenCola is a brand of cola unique in that the instructions for making it are freely available and modifiable. Anybody can make the drink, and anyone can modify and improve on the recipe as long as they, too, license their recipe under the GNU General Public License.
Although originally intended as a promotional tool to explain open source software, the drink has taken on a life of its own. The Toronto-based OpenCola company has become better known for the drink than the software it was supposed to promote. Laird Brown, the company’s senior strategist, attributed its success to a widespread mistrust of big corporations and the “proprietary nature of almost everything.” A website selling the stuff has shifted 150,000 cans.
Sadly, the company is now dead. But since the recipe and the instructions are open source, they are available to anyone who wants to whip up a batch.
Download the Source Code (recipe + brewing instructions)
