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Without Jobs, Will Open Source Suffer?

Posted by kdawson on from the worth-asking dept.

darthcamaro writes in with an interview with Markus Rex, Novell's top Linux exec and the former CTO of the Linux Foundation. While some open source vendors see the current economy as a boon to open source, the interview concludes with Rex's speculation on the contrary possibility. "The other thing is in both Europe and the US the rise of the unemployment rate is something that is rather unprecedented... The open source community to a certain degree is dependent on the willingness of people to contribute. We see no indication that anything might change there, but who knows? People need something to live off." Have you thought about scaling back open source work as the economy continues to contract?

9 of 275 comments (clear)

  1. Not Steve by Mr+Z · · Score: 5, Funny

    Heh... was I the only one who misread this as something to do with Steve Jobs? (And subsequently went "Murrrrrh?")

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    Program Intellivision!
  2. Ridiculous by Dun+Malg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    People need something to live off

    This is utterly ridiculous. It's not like work on an open source project is comparable to giving away money, or hand-built widgets. Nobody is going to say "gee, I would normally contribute this code to that open source project, but I'm unemployed, so I'll sell it to buy groceries instead."

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    If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
    1. Re:Ridiculous by geminidomino · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This is utterly ridiculous. It's not like work on an open source project is comparable to giving away money, or hand-built widgets. Nobody is going to say "gee, I would normally contribute this code to that open source project, but I'm unemployed, so I'll sell it to buy groceries instead."

      No, but they might say "Gee, I would normally write a patch to fix Xorg's gonkulator, but dammit, I have to go search for a job instead."

    2. Re:Ridiculous by Kozz · · Score: 5, Funny

      No, but they might say "Gee, I would normally write a patch to fix Xorg's gonkulator, but dammit, I have to go search for a job instead."

      I'll have you know that the behavior of Xorg's gonkulator is functioning exactly as intended. Marking this entry as RESOLVED: WONTFIX.

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      I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
  3. Boredom is worse than poverty by NReitzel · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Were I unemployed, I would still contribute to open source projects. The only thing I think would be worse than being jobless and broke would be being bored, jobless, and broke.

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    Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.

  4. It should flourish. by Lumpy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If all those programmers that are unemployed want to keep their skills sharp they better find a project or two to join and keep on coding.

    Honestly sitting on the couch for 3 months eating cheetos and playing the Xbox does not make you a useful coder when you finally get another gig. Laid off? go to sourceforge and find something you would like to contribute to, contact the team, and get cracking. Keeps you sharp and you will get spoiled by the no deadline freedom.

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    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  5. Plus, it's a great resume item by Dr.+Manhattan · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I know I got my current job because I had some code in the Linux kernel. Being able to show your code to prospective employers is good advertising.

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    PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
  6. Without jobs, Open Source will flourish! by larry+bagina · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Every time I've been between jobs, I didn't sit around drinking 40s, eating doritos, and watching tv -- I worked on my own projects (websites and software) and some open source software. But when I spend all day working then come home and deal with dinner, running errands, other life stuf... that doesn't leave much time for working on open source software.

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    Do you even lift?

    These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

  7. Title case vs. sentence case by Z-MaxX · · Score: 5, Interesting

    After giving it some thought, I have decided that "Sentence case" is superior to "Title Case" from the viewpoint of precision. By capitalizing words in headings and titles of publications (of which there are many different ways to do it!), information is lost as to whether a particular word was a proper noun or not.

    Furthermore, there are words (capitonyms) that completely change meaning and possibly pronunciation depending on the capitalization. For instance, "polish your shoes" vs. "eat a Polish sausage", or "measure the mass" vs. "go to Mass".

    Using title case is a lossy operation.

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    Dr Superlove 300ml. I use my powers for awesome