Things I'm Looking For

Following up on my recent plea for material to use in a workshop on productivity for software engineers, I’d also be grateful for material on:

How to hand off or wind down a research project or open source software project.

For every beginning there must be an ending, but we don’t like to talk about them. For example, there are thousands of books in print about how to start a business, but only a handful about how to pass one on or wind one down, and many of those are really about how to sell out at the right time. I think the reason is that mortality scares us, but preparing for the end can make the end less likely, and can help make what happens before then more enjoyable. If you have ever shut something down or handed it over after several years, please get in touch.

A legal and business comparison of the new generation of software licenses.

The Business Source License has attracted a lot of fire from open source zealots; the Unreal Engine license also puts restrictions on use, but hasn’t caused nearly as much yelling. If anyone has written a level-headed compare-and-contrast of licenses that the Open Source Initiative hasn’t blessed, but which give users more rights than a standard closed-source license, I’d be very grateful for a pointer—again, please get in touch.