Self-publicist, Andrew Keen, reckons open source will be hit hard during the coming recession. He's wrong. Open source will flourish.

What Andrew Keen lacks in rigour, he makes up in attention grabbing headlines. Economy to Give Open-Source a Good Thumping is not really about open source, but about how business models that depend on giving away free content are unsustainable. But the headline and Keen's economic illiteracy make it worth my while taking a pop at his article.

He makes some huge blunders:

Mass unemployment and a deep economic recession comprise the most effective antidote to the utopian ideals of open-source radicals.

Open source is, at least for me, not about utopian ideals, but having control over my computers and my data.

So how will today's brutal economic climate change the Web 2.0 "free" economy? It will result in the rise of online media businesses that reward their contributors with cash; it will mean the success of Knol over Wikipedia, Mahalo over Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), TheAtlantic.com over the HuffingtonPost.com, iTunes over MySpace, Hulu over YouTube Inc. , Playboy.com over Voyeurweb.com, TechCrunch over the blogosphere, CNN's professional journalism over CNN's iReporter citizen-journalism... The hungry and cold unemployed masses aren't going to continue giving away their intellectual labor on the Internet in the speculative hope that they might get some "back end" revenue. "Free" doesn't fill anyone's belly; it doesn't warm anyone up.

The economic illiteracy of this is staggering for someone who thinks he can opine on the future of the economy.

Now, Keen, listen up. It works like this. During a recession, more people are unemployed. This means the cost of labour declines. It means more people will be willing to work for less. But there's more. Because of minimum wage laws and the way that people value their work is fixed, people don't accept jobs below a certain level on salary. This market inflexibility means people end up sitting at home. Some may twiddle their thumbs, others will spend time (in between spamming companies with their CVs) creating content for media sites or contributing to open source projects. Hence, during a recession the quantity and quality of work on open source projects is likely to increase.

I haven't read Keen's book. And if the mixed-up thinking in his blog entry is any guide to it, I certainly won't be.