Tiny Vibrating Cubes: A Ruby String Theory

Hey folks,

This motorboat takes off from the safe havens of my future, indefinite plans into the pulsating whirlwind of my rather random and rapidly shifting present, guarded by a stern todo list and rather lax calendar.

This motorboat has »Rubyrati« written at its sides, it is a first open-source project I seriously partake in (well, when I was in high school, I used to code an online Python wargame. No need to say, it ended worse than expected. But hey, it was open source too). But moreover, it is a perfect reason for me to send out this message to the world:

Open source brings you money.

Not only if you’re working for some company like IBM that pumps billions of dollars into open source products; no. Open source brings you, a young and aspiring Ruby (Python, Lisp, Haskell, Erlang) developer, a possibility to show off your code to the potential customers and/or employers, but even more importantly, some qualities unrelated to the actual code writing — your testing discipline, your determination to maintain the project, your communication with other participants, etc.

Open source brings you exposure.

When you’re slaving away in some big software development company, you don’t care about exposure. But slaving away for $30/hr probably is not the best way you imagined your career to be — just like starring in third-grade advertisements is no career for an actor. The shiny, glamorous world of software development, with $500/hr rates, Ferraris, trips around the world and shiniest gadgets always available only comes to »rockstar« developers, who managed to get their name recognizable and their brand known.

A »little-known« industry secret — open-source products are much, much easier to market than commercial ones, thus much easier to earn recognition for. Increased recognition will allow you to command a higher place on the ladder of sofdev world.

And, of course.

Open source is fun.