Not if you want to leverage the millions of professional software developers out there. With GPL you're stuck with the hobbyists and the very few companies that can survive getting paid for support of their GPL software.

You know what's BSD/MIT licensed (or similar)? Python, Ruby, Rails, and probably a million other things you use every day. Good software is good at making a community of developers, regardless of the license.

And there's probably a million things you use every day which is GPL licenced.

Bottom line is that both licences are in wide use while focused on different types of code, permissive licences (along with LGPL) are more targeted at framework/library code while GPL is more targeted at fully self-sustained solutions.

They both have their respective strengths, and it's not as if you can't have professional software developers cooperating under the GPL, Linux is a prime example of that.

"With GPL you're stuck with the hobbyists and the very few companies that can survive getting paid for support of their GPL software."

Not really mate.

Lots of companies use linux for firmware and release their firmware code. Linksys, Netgear and Western Digital are just a few that spring to mind.

None of those companies sell the firmware. They sell the hardware. The firmware is only useful if you buy their hardware.

So what? They're still commercial entities using and contributing to GPL software, which is what the post I replied to claimed doesn't happen.

GPL is not just stuck with hobbyists. It also can rely on college students, of which there is a seemingly never-ending supply.

Eventually the students will either have to find a job (assuming they are not being perpetually subsidized by Mom and Dad), or become leaders in the GPL community and make money by writing books and doing speaking engagements; and since there is only room for so many leaders, only the most fervent ideologues will rise to the challenge.