NewsForge: Paying Lip Service to Open Source

"Open source has become hip, trendy, dope, and cool. 'Based on Open Source Technology' is used by more than one proprietary software company as a marketing boast. Even Microsoft, everybody's favorite symbol of software proprietarism, now boasts about releasing software under an open source license. Obviously, the phrase 'Open Source' is now considered a plus when trying to sell software. Will this lead to more open source contributions by companies trying to associate themselves with this 'movement' or will it lead to the death of open source as we know it?

"I've followed the Open Source Initiative's license-discuss email list for years. Over and over, software developers show up on this list and ask questions that boil down to, 'How can I reap the benefits of open source development and still make money selling my software...?'"

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