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It seems like in some sense, there's no right answer. The hard thing here is truly free / open source software relies on generosity. And the more generosity, t

It seems like in some sense, there's no right answer. The hard thing here is truly free / open source software relies on generosity. And the more generosity, the more sustainable it is (on behalf of the developer(s), the corporations using it, etc.). Generosity is not a winning strategy in corporate board rooms, though.

Jeff_Brown 6y ago
Sometimes generosity isn't needed. If a project (including the language it's written in) is simple* enough, casual users can add features they want for themselves. But for complex projects those barriers will probably always be quite high. * "Simple" is a slippery concept. I find hacking Haskell easier than hacking Python, because the type signatures and other features make it much easier to see what's going on with a minimum of investigative work. But difficulty is a big part of Haskell's reputation, and ease a big part of Python's.
coldpie 6y ago
> The hard thing here is truly free / open source software relies on generosity. (I make a living working on an open source project.) I don't agree. The view of the value of software is just different. The software itself is valueless. This is true of all software: bits are free to copy. What is valuable is the work put into making it. In other words, you get paid for making something, not for having made something. If a company wants some feature implemented in some piece of OSS, they can go find a dev to pay to do it, and contribute it back to the world. There's no generosity there, it's just an accurate reflection of where value is actually generated in the software world, instead of the broken view that proprietary software tries to force. Where it starts to get tricky is kind of a tragedy of the commons situation: if you wait long enough, then maybe someone else will pay to implement the feature, but if everyone does this, then the feature will never exist.
- jsdwarf 6y ago
  Agree. In the end commercial and open source software aren't that different: the more dollars you put into it, the more say you have on the roadmap.

Jeff_Brown 6y ago

Sometimes generosity isn't needed. If a project (including the language it's written in) is simple* enough, casual users can add features they want for themselves. But for complex projects those barriers will probably always be quite high. * "Simple" is a slippery concept. I find hacking Haskell easier than hacking Python, because the type signatures and other features make it much easier to see what's going on with a minimum of investigative work. But difficulty is a big part of Haskell's reputation, and ease a big part of Python's.

coldpie 6y ago

> The hard thing here is truly free / open source software relies on generosity. (I make a living working on an open source project.) I don't agree. The view of the value of software is just different. The software itself is valueless. This is true of all software: bits are free to copy. What is valuable is the work put into making it. In other words, you get paid for making something, not for having made something. If a company wants some feature implemented in some piece of OSS, they can go find a dev to pay to do it, and contribute it back to the world. There's no generosity there, it's just an accurate reflection of where value is actually generated in the software world, instead of the broken view that proprietary software tries to force. Where it starts to get tricky is kind of a tragedy of the commons situation: if you wait long enough, then maybe someone else will pay to implement the feature, but if everyone does this, then the feature will never exist.

jsdwarf 6y ago
Agree. In the end commercial and open source software aren't that different: the more dollars you put into it, the more say you have on the roadmap.