The Agentic Paradox: Is AI Scaling Open Source or Smothering It?

For decades, the "Social Contract" of Open Source Software (OSS) was simple: I share my code for free, you use it to build something better, and together we create a rising tide that lifts all boats. This model gave us Linux, the modern web, and the very foundations of the AI revolution.

But as we enter the era of Agentic AI—autonomous systems that don’t just suggest code but plan, execute, and iterate on entire projects—the question has shifted. Will the ease of AI-driven development lead to an explosion of open-source innovation, or will the "instant-cloning" power of agents force developers to retreat behind closed doors?

Why We Open Source (The 2025 Edition)

To understand if Open Source is at risk, we have to look at why organizations do it in the first place. In 2025, the motivations have evolved:

• The "No Moat" Strategy: As a leaked Google memo famously argued, neither Google nor OpenAI has a permanent "moat" in model architecture. Companies like Meta (Llama) and DeepSeek use open-source to commoditize the "engine," ensuring they aren't locked into a competitor’s ecosystem.
• Trust and Auditability: Agentic AI requires high levels of autonomy. For an enterprise to let an agent touch its database or finances, the underlying code and protocols must be inspectable.
• Talent and Standardization: Open source remains the best way to recruit world-class engineers and ensure your technology becomes the industry standard.

The Case for Less Open Source: The "Plagiarism Economy"

The most significant threat to OSS in the agentic era is the erosion of the social contract. In the past, "forking" a project required human effort. Today, an AI agent can scrape an open-source repository, understand the entire business logic, and spin up a proprietary "wrapper" service in minutes. This is the "Amazon Problem" on steroids. When agents can clone the value of a system instantly, the incentive for an individual or small startup to share their "secret sauce" diminishes. We are already seeing a rise in:

1. Strict Licensing: A shift toward "Business Source Licenses" (BSL) that prevent AI companies from training on or commercializing code without payment.
2. Code Obfuscation: Developers are increasingly keeping the high-value "reasoning" parts of their code private, only open-sourcing the low-level infrastructure.

The Case for More Open Source: Agentic Infrastructure

Counter-intuitively, Agentic AI may actually save Open Source by automating the parts of it we hate: maintenance.

The biggest killer of OSS projects isn't a lack of interest; it's maintainer burnout. Agents are now being deployed to handle bug triaging, dependency updates, and automated PR reviews. By lowering the "cost of care," agents could allow millions of small, niche projects to survive that would have previously died from neglect.

Furthermore, the Linux Foundation has already launched the Agentic AI Foundation. The industry realizes that for agents to talk to each other (interoperability), they need open standards (like the AGENTS.md protocol). We aren't seeing less open source; we are seeing a shift from open-source libraries to open-source agentic infrastructure.

The Verdict: Quality Over Quantity

Will Agentic AI result in fewer projects? Likely not. In fact, the total volume of code on GitHub is projected to skyrocket. However, the nature of these projects will change.

We are moving toward a world of "Bifurcated Open Source":

• Commodity Plumbing: The protocols, safety guardrails, and basic agents will be more open than ever to ensure trust.
• Proprietary Intelligence: The specific "fine-tuning" data and the complex goal-setting logic that gives an agent its "personality" or "edge" will remain closed.

The "Open Source" label might become more exclusive, reserved for infrastructure, while the "applications" built by agents will increasingly be proprietary black boxes. The challenge for 2026 and beyond will be ensuring that the "AI Commons" doesn't become a one-way street where agents take everything and give nothing back.