I don't know where Zed gets the idea there was an "unwritten contract" between FLOSS developers and industry. In my experience, businesses have freeloaded and withheld recognition whenever it was remotely possible.
If you go back to the Transmeta years, even Linus Torvalds was doing the kernel only part-time for a while. Full-time FLOSS development has always been rare.
There's an undertone of anger in this post that there is no suitable industry job out there for the developer of Mongrel. Maybe that is a shame, but I just don't find it as surprising as Zed does, I guess.
There is a crying need for some other way to fund infrastructure software projects.
> I couldn't decide whether to vote you up or down.
My policy is when a post or comment has one grain of insight or new ideas amongst a bushel of wrong-headed chaff, I vote up. After all, I have a fully-working pattern-match filter built into my brain, and so does everyone else. The world is a better place when people are encouraged to make positive contributions.
If you go back to the Transmeta years, even Linus Torvalds was doing the kernel only part-time for a while. Full-time FLOSS development has always been rare.
There's an undertone of anger in this post that there is no suitable industry job out there for the developer of Mongrel. Maybe that is a shame, but I just don't find it as surprising as Zed does, I guess.
There is a crying need for some other way to fund infrastructure software projects.