Paper Title
The Importance of Open Source Software

Abstract
The impact of open source software (OSS) on business, research, society, and education is rising. As such, it is essential to understand the meaning, characteristics, and benefits of open-source software. The paper will briefly define OSS, compare it with proprietary software, review its characteristics, and analyze its importance. OSS's unique characteristics include community-based distributed development, reusability, reward mechanism, modularity, and distribution. Some of the importance of open-source software discussed below are control, training, security, community, stability, among others. Keywords - Open Source Software, Proprietary Software, Importance of OSS.