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Re: Why Aren't Open Source Tools Being Considered?
Subject:Re: Why Aren't Open Source Tools Being Considered? From:Rachel Rawlings <rachel -at- scrivovivo -dot- net> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Sun, 21 Aug 2005 05:43:01 -0400
Nuckols, Kenneth M wrote:
>3. To "force" <evil empire giant software publisher> to pay them gobs
>and gobs of money to turn over all the development so it won't compete
>with the established "standard" commercial title, or
>
>
I'm going to take a moment to note here that FoxBase and Visio, among
other currently-Microsoft products, began under independent companies
with closed-source software.
The point of an open-source project is that it's almost impossible for
it to be taken over or bought out, and that so long as there are
developers willing to keep it alive, it need never die. And if you think
it would be possible to put the genie back in the bottle just because
someone paid you to, I'd advise you to read some of the open-source
licensing agreements.
>4. To "force" <evil empire giant software publisher> to pay them gobs
>and gobs of money to come to work for them and turn their "hobby"
>project into a commercially viable title to replace the company's
>current aging "standard" software.
>
>
Again, this seems like a closed-source shareware business model if anything.
>In the end, from what I've seen the only reason anyone creates OS
>software is to get a big payday for their ego or their wallet. Is that
>completely inaccurate, completely accurate, or somewhere in between? I'd
>be curious to know.
>
Ego certainly enters into it, and I would not only not deny but I'd hope
that many open source developers make themselves marketable and hirable
by putting their work out to be used and reviewed by anyone who'd wish
to. But these are not the sole reasons. If they were, then there would
probably be no open source software at all, there'd just be shareware
and freeware.
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