On Sat, 20 Dec 2025 10:21:18 +0100 Matthias Petermann <[email protected]> wrote:
> From my perspective, this would be at odds with NetBSD’s DNA. NetBSD > has always been about technical clarity, coherence, and shared ownership > of the system as a whole. Introducing paid-only features creates a > two-class ecosystem, splits incentives, and ultimately weakens exactly > the qualities that make NetBSD attractive in the first place. The Net/Free/Open BSD projects are non-profit organisations and I don't expect them to change their structure. They accept donations but don't directly provide commercial software support or get involved in commercial deals. Some people/businesses are not too bothered about the politics (open vs. closed source code, BSD vs. GNU, etc) they want to purchase a license and expect somebody else to maintain the software and provide support. If you don't want to be relying on RedHat for eternity, then in my view commercial projects derived from BSD or Solaris would be more than welcome. The only way for a business to stay viable and attract investment is to add their own intellectual property and to protect it. Personally, I would be more than happy to pay a reasonable license fee and have those features available now and fully supported, than wait for the next 10 years for an open source project to find enough resources or volunteers.
