""As is often the case with other successful and active
developer community-oriented projects, it is often best that
management of the project be managed by an independent foundation,"
he explained.
"The Apache Foundation, for example, is funded by market rivals
such as IBM and Microsoft, he said. The Gnome Foundation is also
co-operated by competitors Red Hat, Sun and Novell, all of which
actively contribute toward the development of the software, Yusof
added.
"Meeks added that doing so would also provide a good opportunity
for Sun because it would build more interest around OpenOffice,
reduce the existing fragmentation, and build a larger, more
successful OpenOffice. Sun would then be well-positioned to earn
substantial support revenue from this potential development, he
said."