Why did Makerplane fizzle?

[dougbush]

The Makerplane.org site has no blog updates in over a year, and almost no posts on their forum in that time. Anyone have opinions on why the project appears to have failed or how it could have succeeded? There have been some phenomenally successful open source software and hardware projects in recent years. I understand the motivation of volunteers to help, but how do they resolve differences between their ideas? The Makerplane founder apparently "decreed" that the project would be a new-design 2-place high-wing LSA. There is plenty of competition for such a model, and designing airplanes is not trivial. I think they should have selected a more capable existing design on which all patents had expired, and focused on how to make parts for that aircraft economically. Your thoughts?

[rwanttaja]

Just don't think the market's there. Too much competition, and you can't get much interest in a low-performance design which hasn't even been built yet. Unless your name is Bede, it's hard to get interest in what is really an ordinary plane that's a just a set of pretty drawings.

Ron Wanttaja

[Bill_dom]

In my nsho, he got too sidetracked on the gadgetry instead of getting a flying prototype. If he needed help with the airplane prototype, he should have published whatever files, plans and bluprints he had and allow others to either build or enhance the design.