Re: when companies join over free software projects

[Bart Decrem <bart eazel com>]

Maciej Stachowiak wrote:

> It might be good for each company to try declare some of their people
> at-large hackers; but even so, it will be difficult not to be
> influenced by the goals of the company; both Helix and Eazel are still
> fairly small startups, and the employees doubtless cannot help but
> make it a high priority to make their respective companies succeed,
> even if only subconsciously.
>
> I do think you do raise some important points in general - we must be
> vigilant and ensure that GNOME does not lose it's nature. I'm just not
> sure that giving some hackers free reign is the best way to get there
> right now.

I think the bigger issue facing GNOME is that we need to make sure that
we maintain a critical mass of GNOME contributors who are NOT affiliated
with any company and that we don't concentrate too much power in the two
'pure-play' GNOME companies.  One of the things I feel good about is that
Eazel has gone out and recruited people who were not already
GNOME-hackers to join the company, thus increasing the total talent-pool
working to make GNOME better.

bd