Comment by nneonneo
2 years ago
One of the cool things about open source is that other people can do that for you! I've released a few bits of (rarely-used) software to open-source and been pleasantly surprised when people contribute. It helps to have a visible todo list so that new contributors know what to aim for.
By the way, there will always be things to add! That feeling should not stop you from putting the source out there - you will still own it (you can license the code any way you like!) and you can choose what contributions make it in to your source.
From the encode.su thread and now the HA thread, you've clearly gotten people excited, and I think that by itself means that people will be eager to try these out. Lossless codecs have a fairly low barrier for entry: you can use them without worrying about data loss by verifying that the decoder returns the original data, then just toss the originals and keep the matching decoder. So, it should be easy to get people started using the technology.
Open-sourcing your projects could lead to some really interesting applications: for example, delivering lossless images on the internet is a very common need, and a WASM build of your decoder could serve as a very convenient way to serve HALIC images to web browsers directly. Some sites are already using formats like BPG in this way.
> One of the cool things about open source is that other people can do that for you!
This is a very valid point, but we should all recognise that some people⁰ explicitly don't want that for various reasons, at least not until they've got the project to a certain point in their own plans. Even some who have released other projects already prefer to keep their new toy more to themselves and only want more open discourse once they are satisfied their core itch is sufficiently scratched. Open source is usually a great answer/solution, but it is not always the best one for some people/projects.
Even once open, “open source not open contribution”¹ seems to be becoming more popular as a stated position² for projects, sometimes for much the same reasons, sometimes for (future) licensing control, sometimes both.
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[0] I'm talking about individual people specifically here, not groups, especially not commercial entities: the reasons for staying closed initially/forever can be very different away from an individual's passion project.
[1] “you are free to do what you want, but I/we want to keep my/our primary fork fully ours”.
[2] it has been the defacto position for many projects since a long time before this phrase was coined.
> I/we want to keep my/our primary fork fully ours
The "primary" fork is the one that the community decides it to be, not what the authors "wants". Does it really matter what is the "primary fork" for those working on something to "scratch their own itch"?
Hence I said my/our primary fork, not the primary fork.
If I were in the position of releasing something⁰: the community, should one or more coalesce around a work, can do/say what it likes, but my primary fork is what I say it is¹. It might be theirs, it might be not. I might consider myself part of that community, or not.
It should be noted that possibility of “the community” or other individual/team/etc taking a “we are the captain now” position (rather than “this is great, look what we've done with it too” which I would consider much more healthy and friendly) is what puts some people off opening their toy projects, at all or just until they have them to a point they are happy with or happy letting go at.
> Does it really matter what is the "primary fork" for those working on something to "scratch their own itch"?
It may do further down the line, if something bigger than just the scratching comes from the idea, or if the creator is particularly concerned about acknowledgement of their position as the originator².
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[0] I'm not ATM. I have many ideas/plans, some of them I've mused for many years old, but I'm lacking in time/organisation/etc!
[1] That sounds a lot more combative than I intend, but trying to reword just makes it too long-winded/vague/weird/other
[2] I wouldn't be, but I imagine others would. Feelings on such matters vary widely, and rightly so.
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