Your Word is Your Bond

[shovavnik]

Red Gate,

You are trying to renege on your commitment to the community by playing a cheap semantic word game. You're now saying that you regret having told the community that you intend to keep the product free and that you never "promised" you would keep it free. This is not a naive misstatement. It is insincere doubletalk.

When a company states its intentions, it is making a commitment. To claim that this is any different than a "promise" is disingenuous. Companies do not go out and say "We promise that we will...". They say "We will...". By saying that, they sign an implicit contract with their customers and their community. A company that fails to do what it promised to do, quite simply lose credibility.

And by limiting the availability of V6 until May, you are further changing the terms of the agreement, another clear indicator that your word is cheap.

There's nothing wrong with a company making money; quite the opposite. There's nothing wrong with a company making mistakes; it happens all the time. The question is how to fix it, how to go forward. There are a lot of other options, many of which have been delineated elsewhere in the forum. Going back on your word is probably the worst option.

Your word is your bond.

[gaearon]

Don't do evil.