jprjr
commented
5 years ago I care that it's open source.
I believe open source is what's best overall for software development, society-at-large, etc. It allows the projects we create to become a part of something bigger than ourselves, part of a community of like-minded people. It also ensures software stays alive - if this was closed source and you got hit by a bus tomorrow, the project is doomed, and all that hard work just rots away while people have to start over again.
I am a strong believer in the 4 software freedoms:
- The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).
- The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1).
- The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others (freedom 2).
- The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes.
Other people using the project is a good thing. And software licenses like the GPL help ensure that the code stays free. You're empowering users, you're empowering developers.
I don't see any actions taken so far to be bad actors, parasitic, or so on. If a hard fork happens, it happens - that's part of the beauty of open source, is you enable that. People are free to take the code and run with it in bold, new directions if they want. At the end of the day, their contributions remain GPL-licensed, so as long as this stays GPL-licensed as well, you can bring in changes from these forks, they can bring changes to you, and so on. Everybody is empowered to contribute and keep the code going.
I think a big part of open-sourcing is letting go, letting the bird leave the nest, that kind of thing. You've given a great gift to the community - both the code, and the empowerment for the community to do as it would like with it.
Yeah, you're gonna find people doing things with it that you wish they wouldn't. But you kind of have to let that happen if you want to allow creativity to happen, right? That's part of the package.
At the end of the day you still have the full, existing code base available to you, and you can continue working on it, and people are still happy to contribute, too. Nothing is stopping this project from continuing.
I like to think of closed source as about trying to grab the biggest slice of a pie. You make a product, you want to get users and make the best product, but ultimately closed source can only target users you've already thought of (say, only Windows users).
Open source is about trying to make the entire pie bigger - you make a product, but you open it up for others to run with it. Maybe your slice isn't the biggest, but people who would never have gotten to enjoy it (Linux users for example) can now partake, because there's more pie for everybody. And maybe they're getting their own slice now, but that's OK, because there's plenty of the pie to go around.
skmp
barbudreadmon
gigaherz
ghost
Seeing this with a clearer head, I see that my conduct was unacceptable and for that, I apologize.
I still don't trust TA, and I don't know how trust can be restored there. I think this goes both ways.
I do believe we need to build a community where people are treated more like humans, and there is more respect going on between projects. I'm very unhappy with the dog-eat-dog morals that people seem to expect from each other. I got into emudev into my early teenage years, and I remember it as a warm and nice place.
I'm not sure how that can be achieved, or what part (if any) I should take in such an effort.
For now, I'll concentrate on improving Reicast and will try to figure things out one step at a time
(I'm leaving the original text here in strikethrough so that people can judge for themselves. TA/libretro, if you prefer to have them removed, you know how to reach me)
When I open source the code I thought it was a good idea. Let people share knowledge, collaborate, build on top of what has been developed.Evidently, the primary net effect of open source is to empower parasitic behavior.And I've expected that from for-profit companies and other bad actors.And I thought I could trust the community to help the "good" fight, that problematic/parasitic projects would be put in their place by fellow devs and mindful users. That devs would be supported and shown some kind of respect.Evidently, I was wrong.I'm open to have your feedback on how we should handle this.I also want to know, does anyone actually care that this is open source?Or is it all a mindless drama for the net win of parasitic opportunists?I'm tired.