+ - Sparrow's acquisition highlights the dangers of closed source->
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zixxt
zixxt writes "Google has now acquired Sparrow, and basically all hell has broken loose, to the point of Rian van der Merwe writing that 'we' lost "faith in a philosophy that we thought was a sustainable way to ensure a healthy future for independent software development, where most innovation happens".
The result of Google buying Sparrow (for $25 million) is that all major development on the email clients is to end — only security and bugfixes from now on. The Sparrow team will find its way to Googe's Gmail team, and will, hopefully, work on future native Gmail applications (instead of glorified web pages). As a small, starting business, it makes perfect sense for Sparrow to accept this offer — their financial future has been secured, and they get to work at Google without the pressure and stress of working at a small startup.
The one, only, and true way to ensure this doesn't happen is to use open source software. If the code is out there, the original developer's changing whims is of no material concern. Had Sparrow been open source, we'd have several other people starting forks right away."
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The result of Google buying Sparrow (for $25 million) is that all major development on the email clients is to end — only security and bugfixes from now on. The Sparrow team will find its way to Googe's Gmail team, and will, hopefully, work on future native Gmail applications (instead of glorified web pages). As a small, starting business, it makes perfect sense for Sparrow to accept this offer — their financial future has been secured, and they get to work at Google without the pressure and stress of working at a small startup.
The one, only, and true way to ensure this doesn't happen is to use open source software. If the code is out there, the original developer's changing whims is of no material concern. Had Sparrow been open source, we'd have several other people starting forks right away."
Link to Original Source
Sparrow's acquisition highlights the dangers of closed source More Login
Sparrow's acquisition highlights the dangers of closed source