On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 11:41 AM, jtdjtd@mtnl.net.in wrote:
IMO not at all. The ones who sink vacate that biz space and free up resources. They are replaced very quickly with new ones. We had Hayes and US robotics. They were replaced with a 100 others.
True. But in the case of FOSS things will change immensely. Consider Red Hat gone and you will see a large chunk of contributions gone (or impaired) from the FOSS scene. True, the people still remain but they will most definitely not be able to contribute while working in some other organization, in the way they are now. Heck, some may not be able to contribute at all, given that some organizations have clauses owning everything their employee spews out. Give them shit and they'll trademark that too.
Of course, these same people can also come back together in some other form and build up a stronger foundation. But that takes time and the impact will be felt for some years. It will change a lot of things in the FOSS world.
Having said the above, IMO RH is most unlikely to ever sue any organisation / individual for copying, redistributing and installing- they will collapse from the backlash. But then we do have idiots like the MPAA and RIAA and one can never predict the future.
True. If it does that, it will most likely collapse from within before it gets anywhere, given the number of FOSS evangelists it houses :)