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ffreire | 10 years ago

I believe the argument for open source is that the community can continue to maintain the software long past when the creator stops (for whatever reason). Responsible maintainers will often seek new developers from the community to take charge (as is the case with marginalia[0], the first project that came to mind). Of course this isn't the only reason why folks want ST to be open source, but I believe this addresses your point about abandoning closed source software.

[0]: http://blog.fogus.me/2013/08/12/marginalia-has-a-new-home/

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coldtea|10 years ago

>I believe the argument for open source is that the community can continue to maintain the software long past when the creator stops

We've seen this fail to be so in practice time and again, if not for the software entirely (which also happens), then for less popular ports, like for OS X and Windows.

JohnBooty|10 years ago

Projects can still be abandoned even if they're open source, yes.

But surely the odds of a project's long-term viability [i]increase[/i] if the community has the option of continuing the project, right? Clearly, if the project is [i]not[/i] open-sourced, then its odds of outliving its original author's interest are obviously stuck at 0%.

awalton|10 years ago

We've also seen it hugely succeed time and again, with software like Open Office and Blender, and the vast cottage communities set up around open sourced video game engines.

It's pretty simple: if the software is unique and offers good enough utility, people will jump on it. If it's open sourced as abandonware, it will probably remain abandonware.

Keyframe|10 years ago

Worked out for Blender. Depends on community I giess.