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Look at what kind of headway corporations like google have made in the mind of consumers when they go above and beyond the shareholder mantra. Oracle might make short term gains on their terms but they have started to poison a whole new generation of developers.



Webpages are not a complement to Oracle's business model, thus what makes sense for Oracle and Google to open source are vastly different. If you look at what Google open sources, it's all compliments to their business model. Google doesn't open source technology that it makes money from.

As to going above and beyond in regards to open source, you'd have to look at where NetBeans came from Sun. Look where all that open source got them.


Oracle is not a person to make such a decision; it is its shareholders who should decide how they want to spend their money. I wouldn't want to have a tax (as an Oracle investor or a private citizen) to support OSS. I may want to contribute my money and/or code as a donation, but that will be my own choice.


I don't want to support Oracle's sailboat racing. So, I don't own any Oracle shares. Pretty simple, isn't it?


Larry Ellison pays for that out of pocket.




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