It’s worth remembering a lot of these megacorps do employ people directly to work on FOSS projects. Here’s a quick and lazy example involving AWS https://redis.com/blog/redis-core-team-update/ but Red Hat and others do the same.
I’m not a fan, and it feels almost as if by employing and embedding people in these projects they look to exert control over them. Realistically, I don’t see that as any different than if they were paying money directly for the same control. Except this way FOSS still has benefits after the license change.
In terms of bang for the buck, I’d absolutely agree.
It’s only when a company fully depends on the income of a single client, or closely aligned few, that this becomes a question.
It’s worth remembering a lot of these megacorps do employ people directly to work on FOSS projects. Here’s a quick and lazy example involving AWS
https://redis.com/blog/redis-core-team-update/ but Red Hat and others do the same.
I’m not a fan, and it feels almost as if by employing and embedding people in these projects they look to exert control over them. Realistically, I don’t see that as any different than if they were paying money directly for the same control. Except this way FOSS still has benefits after the license change.
I’d say paying money is not as effective at influencing a project as embedding developers is.
In terms of bang for the buck, I’d absolutely agree. It’s only when a company fully depends on the income of a single client, or closely aligned few, that this becomes a question.