Maarten, Your quite right that there is no guarenteed formula for success, however is will say one thing about the advantage of open source over proprietary software for software users. OPEN source software doesn't die with the company that produced it but thousands on proprietary programs have been orphaned when the producer went out of business or decided to no longer support it.
Look at Eazel Inc. they produced a wonderful File/Viewer/Shell utility Nautilus for open source unix platforms. The company went out of business about year ago but the program & development lives on precisley because it is opne source. I agree with Joel Neely's recent excellent post and that I do not expect REBOL to be open sourced nor would I ever wish to deny RT their natural right to do as they wish with their software, I only offer my opinion ocassionally as to how they / we might help REBOL progress better as a technology. Bets wishes, mark Dickson In a message dated Fri, 8 Feb 2002 9:13:46 AM Eastern Standard Time, "Maarten Koopmans" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > There is no link between benevolent dictators and success. > There is no link between open source and success (Delphi, VB, ...) > > --Maaten > > > > Carl, > > > > what you say may be true if indeed people used non standard interpreters / > protocols or whatever for REBOL or any other internet messaging & > communications system. > > > > Of course you have to have an agreed standards & protocols otherwise the > whole internet wouldn't function. > > > > Perl & Python both have internet functionality via modules & extensions, > and tru they are not as natural & inbuilt or as easy to use as REBOL's > however surely your not trying to say that because these languages are open > source that they are not suitable for multiplatform > > internet communication / messaging are you? > > > > The internet is based on agreed communication standards and protocols & > functionality regardless of whether your working in REBOL, Perl, Python, > JAVA or Microsoft DotNet. > > > > Webservices & the executable internet will be totally reliant on open > specifications & messaging standards > > non of this precludes "roll your own" or open source as long as you meet > the agreed minimum standard. > > > > That's my opinion, which are more successful & gaining more traction Perl, > Python or REBOL? > > > > I see new books & tutorials & resources coming out for these other > languages all the time. I love REBOL and it's potential but i think it's > losing the battle to become mainstream and part of the reason for that I > believe is it's closed proprietary nature. > > > > We need REBOL to at least be specified, Sun at least got that right about > JAVA. > > > > cheers, > > > > Mark Dickson > > > > > > In a message dated Fri, 8 Feb 2002 6:12:24 AM Eastern Standard Time, Carl > Read <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > > > > On 08-Feb-02, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > > > Maarten / Gregg > > > > > > > The good thing about benevolent dictators for example Linus Torvalds > > > > (Linux), Larry Wall (Perl), Guido Van Rossum (Python) is that they > > > > make their program / project source code available, that is why they > > > > are benevolent. Yes they strictly control and decide upon what goes > > > > into the "official" code base or release and that's where the > > > > dictator part of the title comes from. > > > > > > > However with Linux, Perl & python, if some feature is missing or > > > > something doesn't work for you then you can change it or implement > > > > it differently yourself ( or pay someone to do it for you) and > > > > create your own modified version that works for you. These changes > > > > don't affect the "official" released versions but if they're useful > > > > and provide value then they may or may not find their way into the > > > > official code base if the benevolent dictator eventually decides to > > > > accept your patches, or not! > > > > > > That may be fine for some software, but it isn't for a cross-platform, > > > cross-Internet language. You can be sure that once people started > > > rolling their own REBOLs the Net would fill up with scripts that > > > weren't compatible with your version of REBOL. > > > > > > > THIS it aint so with REBOL, BUT I aint complaining about that. > > > > however I for one would much prefer it if Carl Sassenrath adopted > > > > the benevolent dictator model but Iam not going to hold my breath > > > > waiting. > > > > > > > Best wishes, > > > > > > > Mark Dickson > > > > > > > > > -- > > > Carl Read > > > > > > -- > > > To unsubscribe from this list, please send an email to > > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] with "unsubscribe" in the > > > subject, without the quotes. > > > > > > -- > > To unsubscribe from this list, please send an email to > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] with "unsubscribe" in the > > subject, without the quotes. > > > > > > > -- > To unsubscribe from this list, please send an email to > [EMAIL PROTECTED] with "unsubscribe" in the > subject, without the quotes. -- To unsubscribe from this list, please send an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with "unsubscribe" in the subject, without the quotes.
