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I think the point was a financially successful company not contributing to an open source project even after making a bunch of money just seems un-ethical? Mayb

I think the point was a financially successful company not contributing to an open source project even after making a bunch of money just seems un-ethical? Maybe I'm old-school but I still think we should be supporting each other in this type of situation especially if one of us strikes it big? Sure - move away from Nginx but maybe throw some $ their way for the service they provided even if you don't legally have to ...

mehrdada 6y ago
I did not infer that from the OP’s comment, but in any case, I don’t know the specifics of their arrangement or whether they had been a commercial customer or not. Last time I checked Nginx had been doing fine selling itself for half a billion. But more abstractly, I don’t actually agree with that sentiment. I see more of a responsibility to give back in the form of patches and collaboration than throwing $ at the problem. I see the nginx approach of open source simply as a business tactic no different from Windows Home/Pro customer segmentation except Home is free for tactical reasons to kill off other competition. It is a calculated business move; if your business model sucks-—which it obviously did not in nginx case—-does not imply others are acting less than ethically or they should pay you out of pity. (That said it might be strategically important for them to keep your head above water and survive for their own benefit as their vendor, but that’d be a different angle.) I suppose the difference between free software vs open source is also relevant to this discussion, and I could relate to your sentiment when facing the former much more than the latter.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  All fine and dandy, except that those patches and collaboration don't pay bills.
  - chii 6y ago
    > patches and collaboration don't pay bills. implying that just because your open source project is being used, that it is entitled to fund the bills of the project maintainers. I think patches and contributions are a form of bill paying.
    - doteka 6y ago
      Get that “implying” crap out of here, this isn’t 2008 4chan.
    - ivalm 6y ago
      Something should pay for the bills and if the oss project creates lots of real value then I would prefer to live in a world where some of that value goes to pay the bills. The alternative world simply discourages oss since devs would have to work other jobs. There is qualitative difference when you have a dedicated core team vs just everyone contributing patches.
    - rleigh 6y ago
      Patches and contributions take a non-negligible amount of time and resources to review, test and integrate, as well as adding to the ongoing maintenance burden. They might be welcome, but they are absolutely not cost-free and I wouldn't consider them a "form of bill paying", the benefit (if any) is far too indirect and it doesn't directly help the bottom-line in any way.
    - pjmlp 6y ago
      When supermarkets and landlords start accepting them, then yes.
      - mehrdada 6y ago
        Could it be that OSS is simply not a sustainable business model for the long haul and it was simply successful in a period of history when vast money was made quickly by landgrab expansion of technology to consolidate/provide many basic services and the code itself wasn’t the competitive differentiator? I don’t know but that’s a possibility too. I question why one would be concerned in keeping OSS alive, as a business, assuming it cannot survive on its own feet. There’s no inherent reason OSS should somehow forcefully live. It’s already changing its character via AGPL and Mongo license-style things in the face of AWS cloud simply deploying and milking cash. (The above is assuming the concern that it is funding that’s a problem today; I don’t quite see it that way [for instance, I strongly suspect Nginx to have made more money than DBX so far, so who are we to say who’s been more successful; market cap ain’t everything], but that’s a hypothetical to think about.) Moreover, supporting a project does not equate supporting its existing maintainers. It could mean taking some partial ownership including the review side and having some developers on your own payroll. Seems like that’s how the big project are done most of the time. The Open Core model we are focusing on is a niche and arguably more akin to fremium products than free software as a thing with communal ownership.
  - nicoburns 6y ago
    Often big companies employ people directly to work on open source projects that they use heavily. That does pay the bills.
    - pjmlp 6y ago
      Big companies like Dropbox....
wwright 6y ago
For what’s it worth, many companies have a hard time justifying “unnecessary” expenses to their boards or shareholders. Depending on company structure, their hands may be somewhat tied. Not all companies, of course; and to be clear, I think such a company structure is a problem itself and agree with you.
- count 6y ago
  I think you'd be hard pressed to find a board or shareholders who think 'support contract for essential component of our infrastructure' is 'unnecessary'.
  - wwright 6y ago
    To clarify, I meant that it can be hard to convince the board to donate money to an OSS project when there is no "need."

mehrdada 6y ago

I did not infer that from the OP’s comment, but in any case, I don’t know the specifics of their arrangement or whether they had been a commercial customer or not. Last time I checked Nginx had been doing fine selling itself for half a billion. But more abstractly, I don’t actually agree with that sentiment. I see more of a responsibility to give back in the form of patches and collaboration than throwing $ at the problem. I see the nginx approach of open source simply as a business tactic no different from Windows Home/Pro customer segmentation except Home is free for tactical reasons to kill off other competition. It is a calculated business move; if your business model sucks-—which it obviously did not in nginx case—-does not imply others are acting less than ethically or they should pay you out of pity. (That said it might be strategically important for them to keep your head above water and survive for their own benefit as their vendor, but that’d be a different angle.) I suppose the difference between free software vs open source is also relevant to this discussion, and I could relate to your sentiment when facing the former much more than the latter.

pjmlp 6y ago
All fine and dandy, except that those patches and collaboration don't pay bills.
- chii 6y ago
  > patches and collaboration don't pay bills. implying that just because your open source project is being used, that it is entitled to fund the bills of the project maintainers. I think patches and contributions are a form of bill paying.
  - doteka 6y ago
    Get that “implying” crap out of here, this isn’t 2008 4chan.
  - ivalm 6y ago
    Something should pay for the bills and if the oss project creates lots of real value then I would prefer to live in a world where some of that value goes to pay the bills. The alternative world simply discourages oss since devs would have to work other jobs. There is qualitative difference when you have a dedicated core team vs just everyone contributing patches.
  - rleigh 6y ago
    Patches and contributions take a non-negligible amount of time and resources to review, test and integrate, as well as adding to the ongoing maintenance burden. They might be welcome, but they are absolutely not cost-free and I wouldn't consider them a "form of bill paying", the benefit (if any) is far too indirect and it doesn't directly help the bottom-line in any way.
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    When supermarkets and landlords start accepting them, then yes.
    - mehrdada 6y ago
      Could it be that OSS is simply not a sustainable business model for the long haul and it was simply successful in a period of history when vast money was made quickly by landgrab expansion of technology to consolidate/provide many basic services and the code itself wasn’t the competitive differentiator? I don’t know but that’s a possibility too. I question why one would be concerned in keeping OSS alive, as a business, assuming it cannot survive on its own feet. There’s no inherent reason OSS should somehow forcefully live. It’s already changing its character via AGPL and Mongo license-style things in the face of AWS cloud simply deploying and milking cash. (The above is assuming the concern that it is funding that’s a problem today; I don’t quite see it that way [for instance, I strongly suspect Nginx to have made more money than DBX so far, so who are we to say who’s been more successful; market cap ain’t everything], but that’s a hypothetical to think about.) Moreover, supporting a project does not equate supporting its existing maintainers. It could mean taking some partial ownership including the review side and having some developers on your own payroll. Seems like that’s how the big project are done most of the time. The Open Core model we are focusing on is a niche and arguably more akin to fremium products than free software as a thing with communal ownership.
- nicoburns 6y ago
  Often big companies employ people directly to work on open source projects that they use heavily. That does pay the bills.
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Big companies like Dropbox....

wwright 6y ago

For what’s it worth, many companies have a hard time justifying “unnecessary” expenses to their boards or shareholders. Depending on company structure, their hands may be somewhat tied. Not all companies, of course; and to be clear, I think such a company structure is a problem itself and agree with you.

count 6y ago
I think you'd be hard pressed to find a board or shareholders who think 'support contract for essential component of our infrastructure' is 'unnecessary'.
- wwright 6y ago
  To clarify, I meant that it can be hard to convince the board to donate money to an OSS project when there is no "need."