Quote Originally Posted by Zenphobia
The source would only be open for download, you couldn't replace the source on the website that everyone will be using, so your virus paranoia is kind of unfounded.

And a program being made open source does not replace the original developers, it simply lets users tweak the code. With the way copyrights work, Nintendo could not steal it and charge us to use it, since all the code would still be property of the original creators. Besides, Nintendo doesn't seem like that kind of company.

A lot of major game developers make their projects open source so fans can get the most out of the developers' work (Quake, Doom, Tribes).

The first thing I would do if Zelda Classic was open source, is combine it with this open source MMO client (http://www.runuo.com). With some work, we could have a Zelda MMORPG.
What's open source? I know it has to do with the Source Code (which I understand 0%), but nothing more.