[consulting] Is this list dead?

[Michael Haggerty]

Haven't seen much activity on this list for a while. Is this list dead, or
are we all just very busy?

 

An interesting story: without naming names, a friend of mine is starting a
business. He is developing a platform that will use Drupal as the framework
to deliver a specialized service and putting a lot of work into it. Part of
his hook is that he will not be open sourcing some of the custom modules
which are part of the platform in order to maintain a competitive advantage
(i.e., if someone else wants to get into this market, they would have to
build something themselves).

 

While I see the benefits of this from a business standpoint, it does raise
an interesting question about proprietary software. One of the main
advantages of open source is the cost of labor, you can have dozens of
people worldwide working on the same piece of software. Supposedly, the
quality of the product goes up as it filters through peer review and the
expertise of multiple individuals. The particular modules this person is
working on are not really 'understood' by the Drupal community (otherwise,
someone else would have already built them). What I am trying to wrap my
head around is, does losing this advantage detract from any others? Does
losing peer review and contributed labor undermine other advantages to open
sourcing a creation? From a programmers perspective, I can't really
understand why he's choosing a proprietary route for development other than
the idea that few others would really be interested in working on this
particular module.

Thank you,
Michael Haggerty
Managing Partner
Trellon, LLC
 <http://www.trellon.com> http://www.trellon.com
(p) 301-577-6162
(c) 240-643-6561
(f) 413-691-9114
(aim) haggerty321

 

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