I have run into the problem of seeing the subject of 'giving back' for the benefits reaped from Open Source openly mocked or ridiculed. You sit in a production meeting and bring it up and watch the glances and the rolled eyes. Among some people there really is an attitude of "If they're dumb enough to leave it out there I am taking it". It's ignorant and annoying.

I hesitate to jump to a stand of "Yes, monitor and regulate!". It seems to me that 9 times out of ten bringing bureaucracy and regulation to anything usually leads to inefficiency, bloat and a decline in innovation. This is the sentence where I offer a brilliant possible answer to the problem...uhhhhh yeah, problem is I'm not that smart.

I'd like to think educating people to where this comes from and the amount of time and money invested in these projects that save them so much time and money would do the trick. But apathy and greed are a powerful force.

So, I guess I just took the long way to say, "yeah, it's a problem. <shrug />"