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Is Google's new CEO committed to open source?

Larry Page has stepped in as Google's CEO to replace Eric Schmidt, but the company's commitment on open-source software won't waiver. The company has too much running on open-source software, and it needs help from the developer community to push its Android OS, Chrome browser and Google Docs.

As ZDNet points out, the new CEO is a big fan of Linux. The company's search engine is powered by Linux, and the company hosts more than 250,000 open-source projects.  From its starting days, Google has relied on a group of developers well-versed in Linux, and it's relying on the OS to a point where it can't step back.

The question remains: will it keep being generous to the open-source and keep giving, or will it pull back those resources and put them in the company? Developers are happy with Google's contributions, and if the company pulls back, there could be a backlash. Once the mingling goes away, the social experiment ends, and Google could feel the pain. But at the same time, the developer community could suffer.

Developers haven't said much about Page's entry as CEO, so that's a good start. But only time will tell how far Google is willing to go to support the open-source movement.