Is a GPL client relevant

Posted Jan 25, 2007 20:28 UTC (Thu) by alext (guest, #7589)
Parent article: Interview with Second Life's Cory Ondrejka

I haven't looked into it but the question in my mind is do you have to sign up to a particular terms of use when you go on to use Second Life. If so do those t&cs mean they can change things later to lock out any client software that they don't agree with or want. Hence the total and ultimate control and resides there and having a GPL'ed tool to use it with could become meaningless once they have had enough input from that group of volunteers to keep them ahead of any emerging opposition.

The perfect option for the competition comes then from paying for volunteer work with a credit in the company so if it ever amounts to anything of value you are obliged to pay them back. I've seen too many past vague offers quietly forgotten when the owner gets married and a quiet voice in their ear tells them to keep it all for themselves (that's just an example of one such risk).