On 03-Jan-07, at 11:22 AM, jtd wrote:
And that is precisely my point. How come it fell behind. IMO because
of the licence which fosters a certain development model. As KG puts
it "it's the development model, not the licence". I dont agree wholly
with that as it's essentially the licence which creates the eco
system and also gurantees good behaviour by the participants, over
short term gains.
there are two main development models going:
1. an organisation or company running the show, planning the direction
2. a meritocracy running the show, planning the direction
anything under the first model - regardless of the license - is in
danger. Good examples are mysql and mono - both under GPL
even the second model is in danger *unless* it has reached critical
mass. By critical mass, I mean it has sufficient base of developers
that make sure that no one person or one group can subvert it. Linux
kernel has that critical mass. And a surprisingly large number of
applications dont have it - and are in danger.
as for gpl creating good behaviour - remember it is because of gpl
that mysql and mono have no external developer base. Every would be
developer has to assign copyright of his work to the owners. This
constraint is not there in BSD style applications like postgresql.
And, like it or not, it *does* make a huge difference.
I would venture that apache too has reached critical mass.
--
regards
Kenneth Gonsalves
Associate, NRC-FOSS
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://nrcfosshelpline.in/web/
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