Open source and close source are not new on this forum, but can be new to newbies and also many/most people in the world, and before using a software, people need to be able to differentiate between open source and close source software.
Open source software are software that have a source code that are available to the public, because this source code are available to the public, vulnerabilities contained in the software can quickly be detected and fixed. Users using open source soteware can be able to check what they are running on their computer, in that case, there is no power relationship anymore, no need to trust developer, it brings freedom. Open source software can provide high quality code because there are a lot of people checking the code, it gives maximum transparency of the software users are running on their device. Example of open source software are bitcoin core and electrum wallet.
Close source software source code are not available to the public but instead to a centralized set of people, which makes it available to few set of people unlike open source. Using this kind of software, users do not know the source code of the software, and do not know if the software contain malware or not. Users do not know if the software is spying, or maybe developer include a malware in it, or the close source software could be doing something you do not want a software to do and hidden until someone's bitcoin is completely stolen.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_qdhc5WLd2A&feature=youtu.beThis episode was published on Dec 18, 2020:
Why Open Source Matters For Bitcoin: Van Wirdum SjorsnadoIn this episode of "The Van Wirdum Sjorsnado," hosts Aaron van Wirdum and Sjors Provoost discussed why it matters that Bitcoin software is open source and why even open-source software doesn't necessarily solve all software-specific trust issues.
In theory, the fact that most Bitcoin nodes, wallets and applications are open source should ensure that developers can’t include malicious code in the programs: anyone can inspect the source code for malware. In practice, however, the number of people with enough expertise to do this is limited, while the reliance of some Bitcoin projects on external code libraries (“dependencies”) makes it even harder.
Furthermore, even if the open-source code is sound, this doesn’t guarantee that the binaries (computer code) really correspond with the open-source code. Van Wirdum and Provoost explain how this risk is largely mitigated in Bitcoin through a process called Gitian building, where several Bitcoin Core developers sign the binaries if, and only if, they all produced the exact same binaries from the same source code. This requires special compiler software.
Click the link below to listen to the full video