nXain: I'm starting to wonder if it's time for a Spring Foundation that can get sponsorship for this type of project and manage it to completion while allowing the greater community to do whatever it wants. A foundation could also take a longer term view and enable things that can be done via the community. Offhand, I think there could be quite a few parties interested in seeing Spring be successful in the long term.
nXain: The sense I'm getting overall is that there is a very vocal and hostile minority that seem to be afraid of something. I'm not of what - perhaps that with attention to Spring the community will change or they will lose control.
Yes, there are two specific things to be afraid of:
1.) Someone will actually start this foundation you speak of, then like other projects before it, gradually mold the engine and its developers into a vision of corporate splendour. Pimping one or two copy-cat mods to the idiot masses while burning money discussing the cheapest way to manufacture Spring(tm) teeshirts at ritzy corporate luncheons (before quietly having smoth "disposed of" for being so hostile to investors). This is that "losing control" you spoke of.
2.) That Spring actually becomes the "killer app" you speak of and the developers spend the rest of their lives answering the same stupid questions over and over (I speak generally, like "I can't install it on my xbox! waaagh!" not about your questions/comments).
I agree with what others have said before. Your ideas are overly broad and mostly "unactionable". It reminds me of all those Dilbert cartoons where the pointy-haired bosses say things like "We need to form a quality initiative", or "Lets have another meeting to find out why the project is late", or "Why can't anybody make a decision?!!".
These are not the kind of comments that produce actual results (or even useful answers). At the end of the day somebody has to do the code and artwork. That's been said over and over again here. You're not going to do it, a bunch of MBAs and PR people aren't going to do it. If a company comes along to do it, more power to them. What I'm afraid of is the high probability that such a company/commitee/foundation will have a disproportionate amount of sway over the direction of the project; and that the sense of community and garage development will be lost (that's the "change" you were referring to).
A foundation may be useful in terms of promotion or whatever but frankly I'm sick of marketing anyway. If a specific mod is good enough it will acheive fame through word of mouth. The Internet is full of new celebrities that the business community overlooked. If a mod acheives celebrity then modellers/coders/promoters/whatever will be lining the block to get in on the action. Until then there's a certain amount of enjoyment and power that comes from going it alone, or with a small posse. I'm not ashamed of taking some credit and liberties as the payment for my hard work. Also I don't particularly care how long the project takes. As you hinted, perhaps to some of us the journey is more important than the results.
I leave you with a quote from a real corporate memo:
"Lucent Technologies is determined to promote constant attention on current procedures of transacting business focusing emphasis on innovative ways to better, if not supercede, the expectations of quality!"
