hello there! On Mon, Dec 20, 2010 at 12:53 PM, James Morris <[email protected]>wrote:
> Regarding collaboration... Is it a popularity contest? > > :) i found the article interesting, as well. and i particularly enjoy the many things that can happen by publishing free software. whenever i develop something i took the habit of sticking a GPL2 license on it and publishing it. Automatically and without thinking about it for a single second. most of the times no-one even touches the software: maybe someone downloads it, but most of the times noone changes a single line of code or even installs it, for what i know. but sometimes things happen, of multiple types: people installing the software, notifying me about bugs, suggesting changes or enhancements and even participating in the development. It even happened that we mutually created opportunities for each other, be it for conferences, commercial projects or further research. and its nice, natural and productive. because many times code provides inspiration even if not being directly useful to people. People get ideas by even reading the "title" of the software that you're releasing. And it even happens that they just copy that specific routine or function and use it for their own project, creating a diffused state of continuous mash-up which is really interesting from the point of view of the creation and dissemination of knowledge. even if most of the times the software i release remains alone and only i use it, the potential is wonderful and is many times enacted. and it creates a very natural, social, ethnographically alive and multi-faceted environment which is one of the best examples of tolerant, supportive and productive society that i know of. ciao! xDxD
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