Mike Olson joins Hyperic...sort of
Mike Olson sold his open-source database startup, Sleepycat, to Oracle and earlier this year left Oracle to spend time with family. The family, however, had other plans and has booted him out of the house. "Get a real job, Honey!" were the words his wife used to chase him from the house, eyewitness reports reveal.
Well, Mike hasn't managed to get a real job just yet, but he will be spending some time with Hyperic, a leading open-source IT management company. According to Javier Soltero, Hyperic's CEO, Mike will be "helping us develop the next generation of killer products."
I pressed Javier for more detail over IM, and he offered up this lame response:
He's consulting with us a few days a week working on this new product we're launching very soon....
He's fired up about what we're doing (which I can't tell you!).
Javier is like one of those people that tell you they have a secret but they won't divulge it. I want answers! :-)
In all seriousness, landing Mike as a consultant/advisor/interested onlooker is a real coup. Mike has been sniffing around for his next gig. No doubt it will be big. In the meantime, he's going to be helping to make Hyperic even more successful.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
You either tell, or you keep it to yourself.
Even the exception to the rule, Google, is learning this and opening up more.