This thought just popped into my head: how long can Blender survive? When will the day come when the last line of code for Blender is written? How long will it be before the last copy of Blender is downloaded? What version will Blender make it to? How many years will it be until the Blender Foundation stops adding code to Blender? 20 years from now? 50 years from now? A century, or maybe even two, three, or five centuries? Will Blender last a millenium? Will Blender become more popular or more powerful than any commercial programs like Maya or 3DS Max or even Houdini? What do you think?
Hopefully forever. And I’m willing to bet it will be more powerful than commercial apps. Just a hunch.
I don’t think it will ever die. There is a large enough community that will continue to live even after the current “Industry Standard” products die and new ones pop up. One of the reasons for this, is because Blender is under the GPL. Making it viral, so even if the main coders were to stop coding, someone else can pick it up and go. Same with Linux, and other big open source projects. They have a big enough user base that if the head coders were to die off, someone else will probably take their place.
I agree. But my guess is that Blender may last another 20 to 100 years. There may be a new invention that may be more popular than computers, or maybe computers may almost a whole new type of device 100 years from now. Look how much cars changed in 100 years. Think of how different computers will be. But one thing I am for sure of is that BLender will last at least half my life (I’m barely a teen). In short, I don’t think Blender will last forever, but I am certain that Blender will last much, much longer than any other commercial application like Maya or 3DS Max or Houdini, and at least for a few more decades. Anyway, is Linux like Ubuntu? Is Linux open source and/or free?
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Wow. I didn’t think I’d see the day when Ubuntu’s mindshare would outpace Linux as a whole.
To answer your question, yes… Linux is the kernel that Ubuntu uses, and it is most definitely both open source and free.
Until art becomes completely automated 
So Ubuntu is like a modified version of Linux, and Linux is a free OS that can be modified into other OS’s?
I sadly agree with blenditall. Blender can last only until the end of art itself, which, I fear, can’t be far off. There will come a time when all of creativity will be made on a computer, with the only human input being the pressing of of a few buttons. There will, of course, be those who defend art in it’s original form, and will still make an effort to keep Blender going for as long as possible.
if you believe that one day art will be automated…you may aswell leave right now.
You’re on the right track. An operating system is composed of several parts, and the core of it is a piece of code called the kernel that basically runs the whole show, working as an interface between the hardware and software. Ubuntu uses the Linux kernel, and also features a whole host of other programs that form the rest of the OS; things like boot scripts, shells, the GNU tool-chain and the GNOME desktop environments.
This article might help.
Fine art it is the first language of humans , remember the drawings in the caves ?
It is more old that the human spoken language so Art will live until the human end…in other words NEVER!
Music is the third language and still is surviving all the way up.
Hmmm… probably until something unforeseeable happens and the project gets shut down. It certainly wont be something that Ton or anybody else in control does on purpose from what I can imagine.
according to the latest Terminator series:
Ton starts integrating Sky Net into Blender in 2012.
Blender Net becomes self aware in 2015.
Blender Net tries to Render the Universe, Crashes mid render & the Universe ends.
So to answer your question with a question.
How long is a piece of string?
As for Linux being open source…
thanks I never knew.
I thought it was spyware made by Microsoft to steal ideas off geeks with coke bottle glasses.
dummer Kopf
Of course it will die, people and technology moves with time. How many of you are still writing letters with WordPerfect on MS-DOS?
is the blender coder community big enough already that it would be no problem if something happened to ton? who would step up to lead the blender project? who has the same passion, vision and organizational talent as ton? i also wonder this about some other open source projects…
Of course it will die, people and technology moves with time. How many of you are still writing letters with WordPerfect on MS-DOS?
Neither one of those things is open-source. I still write code with vim on the Linux shell…
Sorry, I always though it would get too big for it’s mature self and would spawn children that would reach into new technology that doesn’t exist yet. I kinda got that feeling when watching Iron Man, with the Tony Stark character grabbing and sorting 3d elements in the air in front of him, and spinning it around to look at stuff… wonder what drawtype that was… 
Hey man, I didn’t say I like the idea. I’m just saying that that may happen in the future.
Well they say nothing good last forever, and Blender is great.
The Blender Foundation probably will die off in the next 5 years. However there’s tons of other coders out there.