No subject

> 1) What are the economics of open source software, and how sustainable=20
> is the model?

FLOSS is not an economic model, it's a set of licenses (and of potential=20
future licenses with the same basic characteristics).

You use the license as a tool to come up with an economic model of your=20
choice, but there are many possibilities, both with a pure FLOSS license=20
(which is the case of Ardour), and with a hybrid approach (involving=20
proprietary licenses in some way).

> How does it work for Pd?

There is no such system for the Pd community. Each developer has his/her=20
own "economic model", which usually means something noneconomic like=20
donating plenty of time for little return.

> 2) I get the feeling that open source developpers used to think that th=
e=20
> idea of free (free beer...) software was cool, but 10 to 15 years down=20
> the line (that is, now) they're beginning to realize that they can't=20
> keep on doing this forever. Am I wrong here?

It possibly happens to *lots* of people, but it doesn't make the FLOSS=20
movement getting any smaller.

> I have been considering making a donation since i've been using Pd=20
> extensively for a few years now. But could someone tell me exactly how=20
> it works? Who gets the money?

The person who gets the money is the person you send it to.

> And i never use GEM or Gridflow (cause i have no need for it at the=20
> moment), so i don't see why part of my donation should go to Mathieu or=
=20
> GEM's author(s).

What makes you think that GEM's authors and I are somehow not contributin=
g=20
anything significant to Pd-vanilla=A0?

  _______________________________________________________________________
| Mathieu Bouchard ---- t=E9l: +1.514.383.3801 ---- Villeray, Montr=E9al,=
 QC

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