I'm sure there's a lot of people who only say "I wish this were open source" because that would benefit them personally.
I'm sure there's a lot of open-source projects that are the exact opposite of vibrant communities, and the exact opposite of empowering and user-supporting.
However, as a great man once said, "No Taxation Without Representation". People using PICO-8 and writing games for PICO-8 aren't paying taxes as such, but they are investing their time and creative energy, their efforts advertise the PICO-8 platform, and thus they enrich Lexaloffle just as surely as if they'd filled out a 1040 form. Some people want to be reassured that they have some measure of control over a thing before they invest time, money, or energy into it. It doesn't have to be open-source, but for software that's more legally sound and practical than staging an armed insurrection and writing a constitution.
A lot of people probably don't care what Lexaloffle does as long as their existing games keep working, many people probably trust Lexaloffle's reign to remain benevolent and just indefinitely, and I don't know any reason (beyond human frailty) why that wouldn't be true. But some people want a better guarantee of future performance than mere past performance, and that's where (some) calls for open-source come from.
For me, I'm okay with it being closed source and I'm happy to support Lexaloffle because as I see it, PICO-8 doesn't really have a "moat". First, there's no particularly exotic technology in the closed-source run-time, and secondly the fantasy console limits mean that the games are small enough that it wouldn't be hard to port them to a new run-time if needed.
So for me it is sufficient guarantee to know that even if PICO-8 is closed source right now, a compatible open-source clone would doubtlessly spring up (I suspect there some already, but I haven't felt the need to look) and be settled on by the community almost overnight if Lexaloffle ever ceased to be benevolent. Paradoxically, knowing that is why I'm happy to stick with the official PICO-8 and Lexaloffle for now. It might not be open source, but there's still a clear exit strategy.
I'm sure there's a lot of open-source projects that are the exact opposite of vibrant communities, and the exact opposite of empowering and user-supporting.
However, as a great man once said, "No Taxation Without Representation". People using PICO-8 and writing games for PICO-8 aren't paying taxes as such, but they are investing their time and creative energy, their efforts advertise the PICO-8 platform, and thus they enrich Lexaloffle just as surely as if they'd filled out a 1040 form. Some people want to be reassured that they have some measure of control over a thing before they invest time, money, or energy into it. It doesn't have to be open-source, but for software that's more legally sound and practical than staging an armed insurrection and writing a constitution.
A lot of people probably don't care what Lexaloffle does as long as their existing games keep working, many people probably trust Lexaloffle's reign to remain benevolent and just indefinitely, and I don't know any reason (beyond human frailty) why that wouldn't be true. But some people want a better guarantee of future performance than mere past performance, and that's where (some) calls for open-source come from.