Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S261475AbUJ0ESf (ORCPT ); Wed, 27 Oct 2004 00:18:35 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S261478AbUJ0ESf (ORCPT ); Wed, 27 Oct 2004 00:18:35 -0400 Received: from ipcop.bitmover.com ([192.132.92.15]:32921 "EHLO work.bitmover.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S261475AbUJ0ESb (ORCPT ); Wed, 27 Oct 2004 00:18:31 -0400 Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 21:18:14 -0700 From: Larry McVoy To: Linus Torvalds Cc: Roman Zippel , Andrea Arcangeli , Joe Perches , Paolo Ciarrocchi , Jeff Garzik , Linux Kernel , Larry McVoy , akpm@osdl.org Subject: Re: BK kernel workflow Message-ID: <20041027041814.GB8493@work.bitmover.com> Mail-Followup-To: Larry McVoy , Linus Torvalds , Roman Zippel , Andrea Arcangeli , Joe Perches , Paolo Ciarrocchi , Jeff Garzik , Linux Kernel , Larry McVoy , akpm@osdl.org References: <20041025114641.GU14325@dualathlon.random> <1098707342.7355.44.camel@localhost.localdomain> <20041025133951.GW14325@dualathlon.random> <20041025162022.GA27979@work.bitmover.com> <20041025164732.GE14325@dualathlon.random> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.1i Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 3365 Lines: 57 On Tue, Oct 26, 2004 at 08:00:18PM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote: > Larry can tell you that we've discussed the BK license in private, and he > definitely knows that I'd really like for it to be an open source license. > But I also suspect that Larry will tell you that I haven't been whining > about it - I've been trying to come up with ways it could work out for > him, considering that he's got employees to take care of, and I haven't > been able to come up with anything that would convince him. Fair enough. We (BitMover) wrestle with this all the time, or at least I do. I think that the set of people on this list have no idea how painful it has been for me to do what we have done. I started out as one of you and liked it that way. I saw a problem, Linus needed a tool, and I saw a solution, I could give him that tool. So far, so good. But the effort required to produce that tool cost a lot of money. So I had to start a company, get some help, get other people involved. This is a way bigger problem than I can solve, and as I'm fond of saying, most of the people at BitMover are dramatically smarter than I am and that's what it takes. I went to lunch one day and just for fun, err, morbid fascination, I started counting up what I had put into BK and I stopped counting at $600K. At the time, it represented 1/3 of the money I had made in my life. 1/3. Any of you jerkoffs whining about our license given up 1/3 of what you have made to date to help Linux? I didn't think so. And just for the record, no, I haven't made that back yet from BK, not even close, I'm at least still $550K in the hole. I'm not complaining, I'm just pointing out that the whiners are whining but they aren't coughing up any money or any effort, they are just whining. Disgusting, isn't it? It is to me. The reason Linus hasn't come up with an answer for how we could open source BK is that you guys think this is easy. It's one thing to take a widely perceived as difficult problem and come up with an open source solution and charge for it. It's quite another thing to take a widely perceived as easy but in reality difficult problem and charge for an open source solution. Just ask the SVN guys. That's not an open source project, it's funded by HP and other big companies. The second that funding dries up are you going to go work on SVN? How much code have you contributed to SVN? Or Arch? Or whatever? What? Nothing? But you still have the balls to think this is all easy. OK, that's fine, and that's why Linus isn't getting anywhere with me. I'm very less than thrilled with being crapped on for helping out in the best way could. It's especially annoying when people do it who have no idea what it took to help out the way we did. I've long since gotten over any thought of being accepted by this community as part of them, that's just dead. But if you think I'll sit by while jerkoffs like Andrea and Roman piss all over us for helping, think again. As far as I'm concerned they can kiss my ass. -- --- Larry McVoy lm at bitmover.com http://www.bitkeeper.com - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/