The OSS/donation model is a reaction to how hard it is to sell libraries and dev tools. Between competing open source projects and piracy, it's a race to zero a

The OSS/donation model is a reaction to how hard it is to sell libraries and dev tools. Between competing open source projects and piracy, it's a race to zero anyway. The moment Babel actually has to be sold for $1 is the moment it dies and everyone still using Babel switches to alternate compilers. The project is surviving on fame, and donation's the easiest way to fund that.