Open source is changing the face of computing and challenging $billion companies, what could it do if this community based R&D is focused on other areas such as the environment, energy production, medicine or food supply? An organization free from profit margins and government restraints could change the world.
Access to academic research and publications for all those without university library accounts. Full text articles from a fairly useful selection of journals. Not as good as doing research in the biomedical library at UCLA or Dartmouth, but...it allows
G. Succi, J. Paulson, and A. Eberlein. Proceedings of the International Workshop on Economics-Driven Software EngineeringResearch, Toronto, Canada, (14--15 May 2001)