kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Javier Serrano <javier.serrano.pareja@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Mar 20, 2015 at 4:12 PM, Nick Østergaard <oe.nick@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 2015-03-20 15:19 GMT+01:00 Mário Luzeiro <mrluzeiro@xxxxx>:
>> This type of support and community is what they expect when pay for a commercial product... if something is wrong.. they will ask the company for support..
>> But, this is an issue in the opensource software feeling in general. But I believe some projects are making a good work in give people trust on this matters.
>
> I feel it quite the opposite. For a commercial product it is hard to
> get sane support, while open source projects are very easy.

I see this as a two-dimensional issue. The opposite of free/open is
proprietary. The opposite of commercial is non-commercial. There are
four possible combinations. I think free/open and commercial is a
winning combination. The software stays free-as-in-freedom, and
free-as-in-free-beer for those who want it that way. If, in addition,
we could find a way to reward those who make KiCad such a great tool,
that can only be good. Look at successful free software projects. Most
of them have a way to reward key contributors. Some people get paid
full-time salaries to contribute to the Linux kernel, the Apache web
server and many other projects. I hope KiCad gets there one day. Sorry
for the digression, but I see this commercial-vs-open issue pop up
often and I thought I'd give my view on it.

Cheers,

Javier