[Gnu-arch-users] re: "On PR [...]"

[Thomas Lord]

Asuffield:

  > [...]

I have advocated, but not found any uptake for, the notion
that companies like Red Hat ought to put up a very big
and very loud firewall separating themselves from the larger
community.   For example, they might decide as policy to always
make their patches to public projects available, well documented,
and advertised --- but to never submit them to public projects
officially or discuss them on lists.  Employees should certainly
never participate in public projects on company time and, hopefully,
there is no incentive to feel they are encouraged to do it after
hours for gain at work.

Of course, at the same time, Red Hat and Novell and IBM and
Sun and HP (etc.) can have a low-walled, transparent garden
for their fork.

This would be a bit like a wealthy private land owner who, though he
has many cattle, never grazes them on the commons -- yet does
put a pile of manure by the front gate with a big "Free!" 
sign on it.   The paupers can happily truck that shit to the
commons as fertilizer -- a win-win.

Unscrupulous competitors might still try to embed themselves
in the public space:  that is a good reason for no serious spender
to ever do business with them.

-t