[jwdunne]

Hrm. Musicians play because they enjoy it. Know many a people who, despite or regardless of success, will play just for the enjoyment of it.

Programming is similar. You hear the stories about how some tech founders focused their energy on programming, it took off and they dropped out of wherever.

I'd argue that for every one of those, there are scores of people who do it just for fun like they did, get nowhere but do it anyway because they like it. Just like there are scores of guitarists for your Clapton, Hendrix, etc.

Open source contributions to me look a lot like people, for the most part, enjoying themselves and getting better at a hobby.