Hmm, complicated. I don't get the wanting to be anti-social bit, but I do get the part about projects that are sometimes too much about the social bit. Or rat

Hmm, complicated. I don't get the wanting to be anti-social bit, but I do get the part about projects that are sometimes too much about the social bit. Or rather, the stress that can create. I felt some of this at times, namely the idea of a project became that it must absorb all contributions, and trying to not offend people while trying to mediate that. This is exactly what a project shouldn't do, and in many cases, it's a giant challenge. OTOH, much of what spawned good OSS was people working together across company boundaries, and that means letting up a bit to let other people get their ideas in, even if those ideas aren't the ideas you neccessarily feel are the most important. It's a hard balance. I do like socializing with people I meet through OSS projects, but it can be hard to close the door and say "this code isn't good enough" and "I'm not interested in this" without being percieved as anti-social, or greatly overcommunicating to avoid percieved slights. I do agree with one thing I did read about 0mq though, which was it wants to merge things first, and break things. I prefer more to see software that is designed and strictly looked after. The social element is definitely not first, but it sound be fun. The problem is, with a lot of people in the game and not monetarily invested (this is free, etc), people can get their feelings hitched to the project more than they ordinarily should, if it was a business transaction -- they feel their price for spreading things or contributing should be that the big social element takes over and everybody gets their code in... which is anti-quality in the long run. Again, balance -- and really only you get to feel this when things start getting really busy. I do believe software can be finished though. If you're just continuing it to keep the community around, I think that's when you don't have a purpose. But that doesn't really happen unless you're doing it for fun (like a game) - and if so, great! But yeah, the first goal of OSS isn't just to collaborate for the sake thereof. It should be for the purpose, and you can still enjoy the heck out of the collaboration part.