[yellowapple]

I don't think ripping off LookML is a bad thing; on the contrary, it's probably an awesome thing for Looker to be in the position of shaping how companies model their data and the relationships thereof. At the very least, it means Looker can turn around and say "hey, if you're outgrowing this smaller tool that uses LookML, why not switch to a platform that can meet your scale (like, say, us)?". The more smaller-scale "competitors" aping LookML, the more teams outgrowing those platforms and looking for larger-scale platforms where they can `git pull $old-platform`, `git push $new-platform`, copy over some data sources / credentials, and call it a day. If $new-platform=Looker, then congrats, Looker now has a decently-sized customer.

In other words: Looker ought to embrace the idea of LookML being the data modelling language. Encourage other implementations of it. Treat them as customer sources instead of customer sinks. That's how they can take over the world :)