> Re: Social engineering. Well you guys are demonizing me for what > appears to be a pretty legitimate question and line of inquiry.
I did not mean to imply that there's anything 'demonic' about either you or your question... there is, however, a distinctly different economic model for open-source, and I am suggesting is that perhaps the issue of customer retention in the open-source world can be best addressed through non-technical means. I've been an independent, freelance consultant for more than 10 years, and have never needed to 'close' my deliverables. In fact, although the deliverables are almost always specified in the contract, my clients pay for my expertise, design skills, time and effort in creating those deliverables, not for the code itself: I bill by the hour, not the byte. In any case, unless otherwise stated in my contract with the client, the deliverables belong to them under most typical "work-for-hire" laws, and they are entitled to do whatever they want with them. So, how do I manage to retain these clients if they can just 'walk away' with the end product? With few exceptions, my clients return to me for additional work year after year because of the working relationship I have established with them, as well as my design and development skills... rather than simply because I am holding their source code hostage. > Wanting to > protect the time and effort invested in product development seems to > be a pretty benign objective. Yes, it is. But, as I suggested above, the best means to protect that time and effort is probably *not* by trying to turn open-source *code* into a closed-source deliverable, but rather by developing an effective open-source *relationship* with the client. > P.S. I don't want to mix it up. Appreciate your thoughts and > feedback. Indeed. While philosophical views can be very closely held and argued with great conviction, please don't take any of this as a personal issue. The question of "IP protection" in an open-source eco-system *is* legitimate and interesting, both from a technical and social standpoint, and while I don't concur with your objective (i.e., creating a 'closed source' version of TW), my initial response to your question was to suggest some *technical* avenues to explore (though I don't think they will be sufficient for your purposes). enjoy, -e Eric Shulman TiddlyTools / ELS Design Studios --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TiddlyWiki" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/TiddlyWiki?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
