- From: Maciej Stachowiak <mjs@apple.com>
- Date: Sun, 26 Jul 2009 20:52:07 -0600
On Jul 26, 2009, at 8:30 PM, Peter Kasting wrote: > > So far you have not given a use case (that I've seen) so much as a > vague assertion that because the number of spec contributors is in > the hundreds rather than tens of thousands, there is some not-well- > defined barrier to entry in the above list. As a data point for comparison, the <webkit-dev at webkit.org> mailing list has 1141 members. I would guess a greater number of people are directly affected by WebKit than by the Linux kernel, though arguably fewer are impacted by WebKit than will be by HTML5. WebKit also has, arguably, a more open development model than either Linux or HTML5. There are many reviewers with the authority to approve a checkin, even more people with the ability to directly commit to the code after review, and even more people who have submitted some patches but don't yet have commit privileges. There is no single central gatekeeper, either for WebKit as a whole or any particular version. My conclusions: * Number of mailing list subscribers doesn't necessarily have a direct relationship to either project openness or project impact. * For a project with decent levels of both impact and openness, around a thousand mailing list subscribers is within expectations. * The Linux Kernel mailing list likely has a huge number of subscribers due to unique social and historical factors, not just due to the development model. I would also caution that, by their nature, standards projects are not quite the same thing as software projects. While the way HTML5 has been run is much more in the spirit of open source than many past Web standards, I'm not sure all the lessons can be applied blindly. Regards, Maciej
Received on Sunday, 26 July 2009 19:52:07 UTC