At eLocomotive we’ve been using a web based project management tool called Active Collab. It was free, open source software in its alpha phase but they decided to start charging. I’m all for making money but I think they took a wrong turn. There are already half a dozen good project management web apps that charge and to be honest, Active Collab didn’t have anything revolutionary. It is a solid product but that’s it. The exciting thing about AC was that it was open and was trying to build a community.

I’m not gushing about open source and free products. Many fail to improve and fail to innovate. It takes real work to keep the product on a road map and some strategic community features to keep it growing. If we’re lucky, 10% of users will contribute to the project and 10% of those mods will be useful but there can be a lot of value in that 1%.

Well, we’ve decided to resurrect this project under the name SpoonOS. It will launch 1st quarter with the basic pages and community opening in February. You can keep up with progress at the blog (spoonos.org/blog).