[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
INTERVIEW: Spencer Kimball and Peter Mattis (fwd)
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: 13 Jan 1999 05:09:01 -0000
From: Stig Hackv?n <stig@devlinux.org>
To: SVLUG List <svlug@svlug.org>,
Subject: INTERVIEW: Spencer Kimball and Peter Mattis
LinuxWorld just posted my interview [1] of Gimp authors Spencer Kimball
and Peter Mattis.
The most vocal open source proponents contend that open-source
software can flourish on the strength of globally-distributed
volunteerism alone; but Gimp and Gtk weren't the product of either
Internet-based collaboration or bazaar-style software development.
Inspired by the disucussion of turnover in Tom Demarco and Timothy
Lister's excellent book on workplace satisfaction and productivity
issues, Peopleware (1987), I looked for signs of an inability to retain
talented hackers in the open-source community. It wasn't very hard to
find evidence of a problem.
Progress on the Gimp screeched to a halt when Spencer Kimball and Peter
Mattis left college to take paying jobs. Gimp develoment resumed only
slowly as new volunteers picked up where the UC Berkeley developers had
left off. After 20 months, Gimp is more stable, but it still crashes and
its Intelligent Scissors tool still doesn't work quite right.
Linux and many other open-source projects are thriving now, but could
they be doing better?
The answer to this question may lie in the economics of open source:
can the rewards (both tangible and intangible) of open-source hacking
approach those available elsewhere in the computer industry? If so,
then the open-source community won't have to bid farewell to some of
its most talented contributors. By now, Spencer and Peter would
probably want to be working on something besides Gimp anyhow, but they
could still be working for us.
I am beginning to explore the economics of cooperative software
development on my dev/Linux site.
[1] LinuxWorld catches up with the GIMP's creators
http://www.linuxworld.com/linuxworld/lw-1999-01/lw-01-gimp.html
[2] Peopleware, by Tom Demarco and Timothy Lister, 1987
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0932633056/stigsbookpicks/
[3] dev/Linux: the First Hackers' Distributed Republic (under construction)
http://devlinux.org/
--
Stig ... http://hackvan.com ... 707-987-3236 work@home
Hackv&he;n ... Friend of Hacking ... 415-264-8754 mobile
--
echo "unsubscribe svlug" | mail majordomo@svlug.org
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ to unsubscribe
see http://www.svlug.org/mdstuff/lists.shtml for posting guidelines.