In the middle of a thread on whether Zooomr stole code from Flickr or not, Stewart Butterfield from Flickr has one of the best comments I've seen on our industry in a long time.

... My favorite analogy to software development and product design is music: it's possible to be entirely original in a context where there pretty much every chord progression, every rhythm, every melody and every harmony has been done before, even if it is combining influences and whole elements from those who influence you....

That's truly what our industry is about - making music. Easy to forget in the blur of Google vs Microsoft vs Yahoo or the latest Techcrunch startup.

P.S On a tangential (and jarring) note, the way Zooomr operates perplexes me. You have a CEO who says he isn't familiar with coding ethics and legality and a sole developer who hand waves away suspiciously similar-looking code as just naming conventions. What gives?

P.P.S As always, do read the disclaimer at the bottom of the page (this is my own opinion, yada, yada)