“This one might take a minute to explain. It’s the connection
between the most important and least known event in early American
history and the reason that you should be unhappy that every
business plan I’ve seen recently has the words “Open Source” in it.
If the connection holds up the Open Source movement could be in for
a real challenge over the next couple of years.”
“Some readers know I do a little moonlighting with colleagues
who specialize in doing market research and business development
planning for would-be start-ups. Recently I’ve been seeing a whole
pile of proposals. Nearly all of them employ the phrase “Open
Source” several times in their executive summary. There’s only one
problem. Most of the time, those two words are preceded by the word
“partly.” Can a program really be “partly” open? Is that enough for
most IT professionals? And if it is, does that become a real big
problem for Open Source movement evangelists, not to mention firms
that have already made a commitment to the Open Source
philosophy?”
“The Puritans were among the leading intellectuals of their
time. … They had a huge, if temporary impact back home. And,
after a rough start, they quickly developed into thriving
communities, which attracted boatloads of immigrants. Trouble
was that many of the new arrivals weren’t exactly saints, a
development the founders never anticipated. The leaders of the
colonies realized they had to choose between ideological purity or
growing their communities even while keeping all the new
arrivals inside their churches. Under a minister named Increase
Mather, they came up with a compromise [The Half-Way Covenant].
… The long-term result was the dissolution of Puritan
society.”