From XBMP to XBMC to Kodi: A Brief History of the Trials of a User-facing Media Center

It's relatively rare and difficult to keep a large scale open source project going year after year without the firm financial backing of a larger organization. Since its inception in 2002, the software currently called Kodi has gone through numerous changes, both at the software level and at the organizational level, and has encountered numerous difficulties along the way, from simple communications problems both internally and with the userbase to larger organizational snafus. In this talk, we'll review how the organization has managed to overcome these problems and continue on.

Topics expected to be covered will include a look at the platforms, distributions, and hardware supported today; a review of the history on the Xbox, the switch to platform agnosticism, and the creation of the Foundation; and plans for the future. 

Additionally, an overview of how the organization works and software is developed currently will be presented, along with a look at who uses Kodi, both from a user perspective and a business perspective. 

Finally, we will look at how we grow the organization and how you can help.