Re: In a normal universe
They are not volunteers if they are paid by someone to write the code.
So we are back why they are paid to work on a project and where the revenues are from.
There's a big risk software becomes a side effect of some other interests able to bring in the money to pay for development. Interests that may be far worse than having to pay directly for software development.
Look at Android: it only exists because Google needed a way to gather as much data as possible from users, and smartphones are the perfect source. And the best way to achieve it was working on a phone OS.
If nobody can make money selling a phone OS, you just get what other interests like data slurping, user tracking and profiling, and ads slinging make available, and there will be no choices.
What is worst? Paying for software, or having a surveillance device in your pocket?
Not surprisingly, Microsoft switched Windows software development in the same direction. Take advantage of open source work, and bind people into something with no other choice available, and exploit them to make money.
It's very ironic that the open world promised by Open Source is turning into a world dominated by few monopolies that could grow quickly at that scale exactly because they didn't have to pay for software, and can now "volunteer" some people to some projects that are actually used to sustain their main business - and the code running the latter you will never see....
Biting the hand that feeds IT
