Active State and the PSF

Sun May 27 08:45:40 EDT 2001

"Nick Perkins" <nperkins7 at home.com> writes:

> I was just curious about what is the relationship between Active State, a
> for-profit company selling Python, Perl, Tcl, etc.. and the non-profit PSF.
> Is there is historical relationship between the two?

The PSF does not have much history, yet, so don't expect any
"historical" relationship. ActiveState is one of the two founding
sponsors. In addition, a number of Python activists who work for
ActiveState are PSF members, as well.

> What does this mean for the future of Python?  I suppose that if it means
> that there will be more money available to the developers of Python to
> continue improving the language and libraries, that would be a good thing
> for everyone.

I don't know whether it means that. I guess ActiveState will continue
to develop products based on Python as they did before.

> Is there any reason to be a little worried, or is it all good?
> Will Python stay free?

I'm not worried (but then, I'm a PSF member, too). Python will stay
free, and the primary reason for the PSF to exist is to guarantee that
it stays free. The PSF has 30+ members, and only a small percentage of
those work for ActiveState. The Board has 7 directors, an only one of
them (David Ascher) works for ActiveState. If you want to get worried:
Digital creations has currently three people in the Board. But then,
this includes Guido van Rossum, who has frequently expressed his
interest in having Python stay free.

Regards,
Martin