On: Google clones 37sig: "Borrowing ideas is fair game, but copying an entire app is wrong."

[aristus]

Hmm. It's brutal but not "wrong", by which I think the poster means "unfair & anti-competitive".

The point of this platform is to make it easier to write applications. They proved it by cloning the poster child for the last prod-hype-tivity platform, RoR. Life goes on.

[gaika → aristus]

Wrong in the sense that is not how you make your platform attractive to developers. What happened to "do not be evil"?

[akkartik → gaika]

Really?! If one of the example apps for your platform is a clone of an existing -- and profitable -- service, your platform's suddenly super-attractive to this developer.

[gaika → akkartik]

This is exactly how Microsoft did business: clone, acquire, or kill competitors that had any success running on their platform.

[nilobject → gaika]

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

[kirubakaran → nilobject]

Some might prefer money over flattery :)

[gaika → nilobject]

Oh, that's must be why they took it down.