Kdenlive Developer Jean-Baptiste Mardelle Is Missing

jones_supa writes "Kdenlive's project leader Jean-Baptiste Mardelle, who always used to let people know if he was going to be away for a couple of days, seems to have just disappeared. His last e-mail and blog post were in early July and they didn't suggest any problems. While there's many Kdenlive fans out there for the KDE-focused open-source video editor, it seems new development efforts around the project have ceased. Also the Kdenlive Git repository hasn't seen any new commits (aside from the automated l10n daemon script) since early July. There has been also people in KDE forums and Kdenlive developers' mailing list pondering about the status of the project, being left none the wiser."

Comments

Re:This is why

[Anonymous Coward]

Open source software sucks

Quite the opposite. Since it's open source, it can be forked and can continue development. With close sourced software, once development halts, for whatever reason, nobody else can work on it.

So this is actually an example why Open Source software rocks.

Still involved on September 16

[Camembert]

I did a quick google and found that he posted on September 16: http://lists.kde.org/?a=120532466800019&r=1&w=2 So let us hope that the man returns. On a bigger topic, this is the kind of software that would really benefit from having far more contributors. I am not a programmer but I'd think that working on a video editor is rather cool.

GEEZ. Let's all just engage in rank speculation

[Anonymous Coward]

It took me two minutes to get an address and telephone number for the guy. Maybe it's current, maybe it's not. But instead of just pointlessly speculating, maybe somebody who personally knows him from KDE events should give him a call and see how he's doing. On a side note, I can't believe this is on /. Phoronix? Yes, because its a worthless gossip rag. It's getting really old with /. taking crap articles from Phoronix and putting them on the front page.

Re:GEEZ. Let's all just engage in rank speculation

[rmdingler]

This is the loathesome pretentious side of /. This story, with (x)+/- readers and comments -not statistically insignificantly including you and yours- , has piqued my own good interest enough to comment a second time. That a single grandiloquent pos(t)er would not only attempt to modwhore a perceived populist highbrow view of article selection, but gain the three positive mods despite his rather less than opaque pandering, well as you can tell, leaves me speechless. It's called the "F_rehose" and may I buy you a vowel?

Re:Hate to say it...

[Anonymous Coward]

We've had two people die in the year and a half since I started this job, we still release and bugfix.

And you're still there?! Get out while you have a chance!

Re:This is why

[Anonymous Coward]

I've noted in my career that you see this happen to proprietary products (of all types). Unless the product has large well organized team and good cash flow to support it, the departure of a keep person often results in the product becoming an orphan. The hurdle of training up a new staff member is too large compared to other things the company could spend money on, and the product dies.

NSA was June, a lot of people dropped off the net

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of people dropped off the Net in July, well at least they stopped posting and doing stuff until they can secure their email, and communications.

Re:Reasons - He probably had a kid

[edremy]

Depends. For us, it was a zero warning phone call telling us to come pick up our son at the hospital. For #2, we were on vacation and got "How fast can you get to Norfolk?"

/Adoption can be amusing...

Re:Plenty of OSS are abandoned today

[maxwell demon]

Yes, the difference between Open Source and closed source is that often the Open Source project gets visible before it gets finished, therefore you see the projects that failed early on. OTOH closed source is usually not released before the developer considers it ready for use, therefore you'll never get to see most failed close source projects.