At, OSCON, the Eclipse "ecosystem guy" (I think it was Donald Smith) had a nice overview of what he was up to, and how he measured "ecosystem strength". It gave

At, OSCON, the Eclipse "ecosystem guy" (I think it was Donald Smith) had a nice overview of what he was up to, and how he measured "ecosystem strength". It gave me pause, because that was the first thing that really nailed why tech like Java takes off. Productivity, robustness, and niche creation. http://www.oscon.com/oscon2010/public/schedule/detail/13307 http://www.oscon.com/oscon2010/public/schedule/detail/13307 I figured I'd just drop a link to it, because it's interesting to compare with "hacker instinct". Java got the ecosystem rolling really quickly; it would be interesting to compare that kind of growth across different tech.