The blogs have been saying that after less than seven months under Sun MySQL author and CTO Monty Widenius has had enough and is quitting.

The news has yet to be confirmed though MySQL allows that it may happen.

It says, "Should Monty leave MySQL, it would signal the dawn of a new era. Over the last several years, we have developed our engineering team to be independent of single persons - including Monty. Naturally, the value that Monty as a core member has provided has been enormous, but at the same time we have tried to make sure that we have back-ups and stand-ins. We are not done with that work, but we're getting in shape.

"Monty leaving us would be a sad moment in that it changes a model we have been working under for the last 13 years. At the same time I'm sure we'll continue to work with Monty and turn to him as a superb expert in key areas of technology."

Reportedly Widenius, a major MySQL stockholder before its billion-dollar acquisition, has been thinking about retiring from MySQL for years and retreating to small company of his own where he could focus pet issues related to MySQL.

At press time the word was out that he had invested in a Finnish company called IT Mill, combining Java with RIA, that's been growing at 50% a year for the last three years. Widenius will be on the board. Looks like he will be investing in other Finnish concerns too.