Software? Hmmm.

I've been doing a little research about software developing, and there are many different views. Eric Raymond is a strong advocate of open-source software (See OpenSource.org). The big problem that I see with open-source is this: How in the world are you supposed to make money? I mean yeah, you'll probably provide a good product for free, but how do you make a living off of that?

Of course, open-source does have it's advantages. People can improve on it and tweak it so it does exactly what they want, you can get great people working on your product as a team, and you might have a lot more fun. You also don't have to worry about getting the money, setting up a secure credit-card website, yada yada yada.

I'm not sure whether I want to create open- or closed-source software. Seeing as I have no immediate plans to make a full-fledged program, I don't need to decide right now.

Another note: You should read Eric Raymond's article called "How To Become A Hacker." It's very good.