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The discussion about being open source has been extensively debated. In order to change the economics of open source, we believe you need to do things different

The discussion about being open source has been extensively debated. In order to change the economics of open source, we believe you need to do things differently. At the moment we are not open source because we need to get the project off the ground. We believe that in order to grow to a suitable level where we can talk about becoming open source, we need to have the control and swiftness of a proprietary startup to be able to first establish a marketplace that proves this new business model. Please note that we are all for becoming open source in the future.

Stevvo 7y ago
"the control and swiftness of a proprietary startup"... What a load of BS. It's literally flicking a switch on your repository. Nothing else needs to change about how you do things. I won't be supporting this venture, because you have made it clear you are not interested in supporting OSS. Your interest is in exploiting a market opportunity.
- mch82 7y ago
  Having read about the beginnings of a lot of open source projects it is common for an initial period of “closed” small team development. Episode 32 of the Django Chat podcast touches on this topic at 34 minutes in. DHH talks about the benefits of a small group of people working fast to shape a feature before releasing it to the community. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/django-chat/id1451536459?i=1000451164141 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/django-chat/id14515364...
  - hbadgery 7y ago
    Thank you for such an insightful comment. This is exactly the approach we are taking to launch OpenTeams. By having a small "closed" group focus on launching key features, we believe that our new business model will become the default approach to helping open source projects become sustainable.
- hbadgery 7y ago
  Thank you for your feedback. I empathise with your concern, but the only thing we are interested in is supporting OSS. Travis has been in the industry for over 20 years and his life is open source software. This is where his interests lie. The sole purpose of this company is to bring together organizations using open source software with creators and maintainers of the software to facilitate and grow funding opportunities. This is needed so that open source can become sustainable. In order to achieve this mission, revenue is needed to make sure that we are actually capable of supporting OSS. One of our main goals at OpenTeams is to channel more funding and resources into community-driven projects, to support transparency in their governance, and keep the communities around them healthy and accelerate their development. We do this in a way that keeps the community in charge of its destiny.
- xwowsersx 7y ago
  I promise this is a genuine question. Can someone explain the background here that explains why discussions about open-source to turn explosive? Like, the point here is that if this venture means to support open-source then it should open-source its own stuff (which means what here? Its website, I guess)? I mean, I guess that makes sense to me? But why so much passion about this? LOL, I really don't get it. I really think I'm missing some basic background. In my mind I'm thinking "hmm, that's a good point. Kind of inconsistent..." but I never make the leap to "you clearly are NOT interested in supporting open-source". Can someone explain it to me? I promise if any of this sounds flippant, it's unintentional. I really think there's some OSS history I'm unaware of that makes me not understand these exchanges.
  - mch82 7y ago
    I doubt there is a single correct answer to your question. That said, two things come to mind... First, commercial software used to be very anti open source. See [1]. As a result, there can be distrust & skepticism when commercial companies get involved in open source. Second, there are a range of “open source” licenses reflecting a broad spectrum of values and beliefs about how much code should be shared and with what restrictions/obligations. So, people enter into the discussion from a variety of view points. Some people only use GPL or AGPL software and won’t participate in online forums unless the forum software is released under those licenses. People in that group might feel excluded from OpenTeams in the same way someone who is a strict vegan might feel excluded at a vegetarian restaurant. [1]: “Balmer: ‘Linux is a Cancer’” (2001), https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_cancer/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_...
- onion2k 7y ago
  It's literally flicking a switch on your repository. That's technically true if you believe "open source" is just about having the right text file in a repo, but there's much more to it if you want to consider the ethics, responsibilities, and legal ramifications of how you choose to license your project. There is absolutely nothing stopping someone creating an open source project and exploiting a market opportunity at the same time. The perception that "open source === done for altruistic reasons" is one of the most common misconceptions about OSS, and really should be changed.
  - Stevvo 7y ago
    You must consider the same same items in your decision to be closed-source. Your second point, that is exactly what I wish for.
- dang 7y ago
  This crosses into personal attack, which is not acceptable on HN, and particularly breaks the Show HN guidelines. We want people to be able to share their work here without being harangued and disincentivized. I'm sure you can express your substantive points thoughtfully, so please do that in the future. And if you wouldn't mind reviewing the Show HN rules and the site rules, we'd be grateful: https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
mch82 7y ago
Assuming OpenTeams is built on Django/Flask (based on the large number of Python projects), it would also be cool just to submit code/doc improvements or support back to those projects.
- hbadgery 7y ago
  With the founders heavily involved in open source, the notion of giving back is one of the OpenTeam's core values. Thank you for your suggestion. We could not agree more with you!
- chendjoue 7y ago
  Hi there, I'm part of OpenTeams. Members of our team are contributors and maintainers of several projects within the scientific python community. Our goal is not just to contribute funding, but to also contribute time/code. As we grow, we'll do our best to be part of many more projects.

Stevvo 7y ago

"the control and swiftness of a proprietary startup"... What a load of BS. It's literally flicking a switch on your repository. Nothing else needs to change about how you do things. I won't be supporting this venture, because you have made it clear you are not interested in supporting OSS. Your interest is in exploiting a market opportunity.

mch82 7y ago
Having read about the beginnings of a lot of open source projects it is common for an initial period of “closed” small team development. Episode 32 of the Django Chat podcast touches on this topic at 34 minutes in. DHH talks about the benefits of a small group of people working fast to shape a feature before releasing it to the community. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/django-chat/id1451536459?i=1000451164141 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/django-chat/id14515364...
- hbadgery 7y ago
  Thank you for such an insightful comment. This is exactly the approach we are taking to launch OpenTeams. By having a small "closed" group focus on launching key features, we believe that our new business model will become the default approach to helping open source projects become sustainable.
hbadgery 7y ago
Thank you for your feedback. I empathise with your concern, but the only thing we are interested in is supporting OSS. Travis has been in the industry for over 20 years and his life is open source software. This is where his interests lie. The sole purpose of this company is to bring together organizations using open source software with creators and maintainers of the software to facilitate and grow funding opportunities. This is needed so that open source can become sustainable. In order to achieve this mission, revenue is needed to make sure that we are actually capable of supporting OSS. One of our main goals at OpenTeams is to channel more funding and resources into community-driven projects, to support transparency in their governance, and keep the communities around them healthy and accelerate their development. We do this in a way that keeps the community in charge of its destiny.
xwowsersx 7y ago
I promise this is a genuine question. Can someone explain the background here that explains why discussions about open-source to turn explosive? Like, the point here is that if this venture means to support open-source then it should open-source its own stuff (which means what here? Its website, I guess)? I mean, I guess that makes sense to me? But why so much passion about this? LOL, I really don't get it. I really think I'm missing some basic background. In my mind I'm thinking "hmm, that's a good point. Kind of inconsistent..." but I never make the leap to "you clearly are NOT interested in supporting open-source". Can someone explain it to me? I promise if any of this sounds flippant, it's unintentional. I really think there's some OSS history I'm unaware of that makes me not understand these exchanges.
- mch82 7y ago
  I doubt there is a single correct answer to your question. That said, two things come to mind... First, commercial software used to be very anti open source. See [1]. As a result, there can be distrust & skepticism when commercial companies get involved in open source. Second, there are a range of “open source” licenses reflecting a broad spectrum of values and beliefs about how much code should be shared and with what restrictions/obligations. So, people enter into the discussion from a variety of view points. Some people only use GPL or AGPL software and won’t participate in online forums unless the forum software is released under those licenses. People in that group might feel excluded from OpenTeams in the same way someone who is a strict vegan might feel excluded at a vegetarian restaurant. [1]: “Balmer: ‘Linux is a Cancer’” (2001), https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_cancer/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_...
onion2k 7y ago
It's literally flicking a switch on your repository. That's technically true if you believe "open source" is just about having the right text file in a repo, but there's much more to it if you want to consider the ethics, responsibilities, and legal ramifications of how you choose to license your project. There is absolutely nothing stopping someone creating an open source project and exploiting a market opportunity at the same time. The perception that "open source === done for altruistic reasons" is one of the most common misconceptions about OSS, and really should be changed.
- Stevvo 7y ago
  You must consider the same same items in your decision to be closed-source. Your second point, that is exactly what I wish for.
dang 7y ago
This crosses into personal attack, which is not acceptable on HN, and particularly breaks the Show HN guidelines. We want people to be able to share their work here without being harangued and disincentivized. I'm sure you can express your substantive points thoughtfully, so please do that in the future. And if you wouldn't mind reviewing the Show HN rules and the site rules, we'd be grateful: https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

mch82 7y ago

Assuming OpenTeams is built on Django/Flask (based on the large number of Python projects), it would also be cool just to submit code/doc improvements or support back to those projects.

hbadgery 7y ago
With the founders heavily involved in open source, the notion of giving back is one of the OpenTeam's core values. Thank you for your suggestion. We could not agree more with you!
chendjoue 7y ago
Hi there, I'm part of OpenTeams. Members of our team are contributors and maintainers of several projects within the scientific python community. Our goal is not just to contribute funding, but to also contribute time/code. As we grow, we'll do our best to be part of many more projects.