Can Eclipse Survive Without IBM?

I bet you this title got your attention…

Let
me tell you a story. It’s one a lot of us Eclipse “insiders” know from
our trip to Ludwigsburg, Germany. If you look at the program for Eclipse Summit Europe,
you’ll notice a distinct lack of Eclipse Platform committers, i.e.
IBMers, presenting. And one of them was lucky enough to get his travel
approval the Friday afternoon before the conference. The Summit was a
resounding success despite that. The Eclipse community in Europe has
gone well past caring about the traditional Platform and are looking at
really cool technologies like OSGi with Equinox and Modeling (despite
Dave Thomas’ decree that modeling sucks, which it does, at least
UML-like modeling).

Now, I’m not sure if this year is any
different from previous ESE’s. But with the discussions we’re having on
the EclipseCon program committee about how many IBMers will be able to
attend to give their presentations, it’s got me thinking. What happens
if this apparent trend continues and we loose the commitment IBM has
made to Eclipse. Can Eclipse survive without IBM?

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