7 ms·

Lessons from building and growing an open source SaaS

173 points by markosaric 6y ago

donohoe 6y ago
I’ll be interested to see how the plan for bi-annual releases for self-hosted analytics goes - in theory that will be better
- markosaric 6y ago
  for sure. we spoke to some more experienced open source developers and this was the idea they proposed. we thought it's worth a try
digitalbase 6y ago
interesting article. outside of gitlab, ghost.org are there other companies that embrace this model?
- cheeseblubber 6y ago
  We have a similar model at Papercups where our product is open source https://github.com/papercups-io/papercups https://github.com/papercups-io/papercups but we charge for hosting. We're big fans of Plausible since we both follow a similar model and are both written in Elixir :)
  - ukutaht 6y ago
    high five!
- ukutaht 6y ago
  Quite a few new players with this model. Off the top of my head: https://papercups.io/ https://papercups.io/ https://www.getoutline.com/ https://www.getoutline.com/ https://write.as/ https://write.as/ https://www.flagsmith.com/ https://www.flagsmith.com/ https://posthog.com/ https://posthog.com/
  - dljsjr 6y ago
    Not to be pedantic but out of all of those, Outline is not actually open source; they're source available but they're using the BSL, which is "source available now and open source in the future"
    - ukutaht 6y ago
      Fair enough. BSL is technically not open source but it is endorsed by Bruce Perens of the Open Source Initiative and I believe it is a very good license for new startups in this space. https://itsfoss.com/making-the-business-source-license-open-source-compliant/ https://itsfoss.com/making-the-business-source-license-open-...
      - dljsjr 6y ago
        I have no beef w/ the BSL. I think it's a great license. It's just not quite open source is all.
- strzibny 6y ago
  I made a list a while ago when I was making the decision[0]. I started on Fathom and moved to Plausible. [0] https://nts.strzibny.name/privacy-oriented-alternatives-to-google-analytics/ https://nts.strzibny.name/privacy-oriented-alternatives-to-g...
pul 6y ago
I've been using Plausible for https://www.nslookup.io https://www.nslookup.io for about a month now. I can definitely recommend it over Google Analytics. Simpler, more intuitive and privacy first. However, at some point I'd like to monetize this site. I know there's https://www.ethicalads.io/ https://www.ethicalads.io/, but they've limited their target audience to developers. Are there any privacy focused ad networks?
- forsaken 6y ago
  NSLookup definitely looks like a fit for us at EthicalAds. You can ping me at the email in my bio and we can get you signed up.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- markosaric 6y ago
  thank you! it's great to see some more ethical alternatives available for site owners
talolard 6y ago
Question for OP Can you share how you manage the borders between the open source product and the infrastructure for offering a SaaS As a trivial example, I’m assuming youre using plausible in plausible, do you have protections ensuring secrets don’t leak to the open source for history ?
- ukutaht 6y ago
  Sure, our main repository comes with a production-ready Dockerfile: https://github.com/plausible/analytics https://github.com/plausible/analytics We also have a separate repository with examples and code for how to host Plausible Analytics with docker-compose: https://github.com/plausible/hosting https://github.com/plausible/hosting The hosting repo includes everything you need including databases, MaxMind GeoIP database, reverse proxy for SSL, etc. We don't host with docker-compose ourselves because we want to scale our databases independently from the app server. I'm not sure I understand your question. Secrets should never be committed to source control, whether the repo is public or not. Being open source does not change how we manage secrets in the slightest. Does that answer your question?
crazypython 6y ago
GNU argues that you should not use MIT or LGPLv3 for your library, because then the library will be used in proprietary software to oppress and tyrant people, possibly including yourself. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-not-lgpl.html https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-not-lgpl.html
- mrmonkeyman 6y ago
  Oppression is highly profitable. 1. Live in a cardboard box under a bridge being shanked to death by a fellow hobo 2. Sail around the world on yachts surrounded by scandily clad supermodels. Choose wisely.
jamil7 6y ago
I've been running Plausible for two of my sites on a Dokku instance for the last few months. I would highly recommend it to anyone who wants some simple metrics without invading people's privacy.
- markosaric 6y ago
  thanks! glad you're enjoying Plausible!
gmanis 6y ago
Love plausible analytics. Upgraded to a paid plan for my project which is getting some traction and I was able to get exactly the kind of analytics I was looking for. I also share similar principles with regards to user privacy and so it’s definitely something I want people to use more and advocate for. Great work folks.
- markosaric 6y ago
  thank you for your support!
WealthVsSurvive 6y ago
Open source is not the antidote to surveillance capitalism. Something like this, however, is: https://anonymous.4open.science/r/e85a54a3-983d-498c-8672-0aa120fcfce2/ https://anonymous.4open.science/r/e85a54a3-983d-498c-8672-0a...
- remram 6y ago
  > The person or entity is not engaged in commercial use of the Software This make it seem you can't use the software at all, even if your company satisfies their conditions.
simplehuman 6y ago
I am impressed with your business but the open source development model is worrying. Why not release as normally as you would in your SaaS? It's fine if this is the invisible "hook" where you get an unstable product if you self-host(and from the outside, it seems that's what this is). also, fathom also has pretty much stopped all development :/.
- markosaric 6y ago
  thanks! all our code is still on github so you could just download the "testing" version we use on the cloud and run that. the slower schedule of the official "stable" self-hosted release is to simply make it possible for us to make it work. we're a two person team and because of the popularity of the product, we've become overwhelmed with support requests from self-hosters and needed to make a change in the expectations and the process
jabo 6y ago
I’m working on an open source search alternative to Algolia, called Typesense [1], with a hosted SaaS option [2]. So our business model is very similar to Plausible. re: OSS licensing, we use GPL and have been very hesitant about using something like AGPL. I’ve personally seen developers not use projects only because they’re AGPL. Even GPL seems to scare some developers. Question for HN: have you recently wanted to use an OSS project in your stack and then stayed away from using it only because of its license? If so, what license was it and what about the license prevented you from using it? [1] https://github.com/typesense/typesense https://github.com/typesense/typesense [2] https://cloud.typesense.org https://cloud.typesense.org
- blendergeek 6y ago
  > re: OSS licensing, we use GPL and have been very hesitant about using something like AGPL. I’ve personally seen developers not use projects only because they’re AGPL. Even GPL seems to scare some developers. Do you think it is more likely to scare your potential paying customers, your potential contributors, or potential freeloaders? I expect that is likely to scare people in this order: 1. Freeloaders 2. Contributors 3. Customers If I have a Free Software project, I want to scare freeloaders while still welcoming potential customers and contributors. I know its a balancing act, but I like the AGPL.
  - jabo 6y ago
    Unfortunately it seems to scare people in all those categories. People typically start using it for free and over time, some of them become contributors and/or paying customers. So if a license scares the people who start using it for free, it then inherently hurts contributions and customers long term.
  - TAForObvReasons 6y ago
    The order is closer to 1. Contributors 2. Customers 3. Freeloaders The type of person who is likely to contribute will be the first to look at the license, and AGPL will rightfully worry them. For the open source funnel, the potential customers start off as "freeloaders". They are more likely to look at the license in the first place because they are more likely to be using the software in a commercial setting and have to worry about licensing. The AGPL concerns hit them first. The freeloaders will just switch over to a more liberally licensed project.
shafyy 6y ago
I've been using Plausible for almost a month now and I love it. Previously, I have been using Simple Analytics, which is also great from a privacy perspective. But I personally just like Plausible more because it's open source, self-hostable (although I currently don't) and has better UX/UI.
luord 6y ago
> There’s no longer any guarantee that, we as creators of Plausible, will be able to help out with your self-hosting issues [...] be prepared to troubleshoot your issues, read our documentation or get community support in the forum. This is sane, and how most other open source applications or tools work. Don't see any reason why this one should be different.
- markosaric 6y ago
  thanks! perhaps because we're new to open source maintenance, but early on we tried to help each and every support request from self-hosters and it quickly turned out an impossible task. we do help every paying subscriber so tried to do the same for self-hosters but unfortunately it gets very difficult with our limited resources. so now we're simply setting expectations straight so people know what they can or cannot expect
mike31fr 6y ago
I had never considered that a paying SaaS could be open source and that raises some questions to me, like: 1. Why would people pay instead of just downloading your code and running it for free? 2. Couldn't anyone grab your code, tweak the UI to make it look different and then sell it as their own SaaS which would be your competitor taking some market share away from you with your own code?
- mixmastamyk 6y ago
  1. Most folks interested in a saas probably don't want to host it themselves. 2. Code needs maintenance and expertise to run. Could you download the source of a large app and compete against it profitably? Maybe if it were mature, well documented, and longtime contributors hired.

173 points by markosaric 6y ago

I’ll be interested to see how the plan for bi-annual releases for self-hosted analytics goes - in theory that will be better

markosaric 6y ago
for sure. we spoke to some more experienced open source developers and this was the idea they proposed. we thought it's worth a try

digitalbase 6y ago

interesting article. outside of gitlab, ghost.org are there other companies that embrace this model?

cheeseblubber 6y ago
We have a similar model at Papercups where our product is open source https://github.com/papercups-io/papercups https://github.com/papercups-io/papercups but we charge for hosting. We're big fans of Plausible since we both follow a similar model and are both written in Elixir :)
- ukutaht 6y ago
  high five!
ukutaht 6y ago
Quite a few new players with this model. Off the top of my head: https://papercups.io/ https://papercups.io/ https://www.getoutline.com/ https://www.getoutline.com/ https://write.as/ https://write.as/ https://www.flagsmith.com/ https://www.flagsmith.com/ https://posthog.com/ https://posthog.com/
- dljsjr 6y ago
  Not to be pedantic but out of all of those, Outline is not actually open source; they're source available but they're using the BSL, which is "source available now and open source in the future"
  - ukutaht 6y ago
    Fair enough. BSL is technically not open source but it is endorsed by Bruce Perens of the Open Source Initiative and I believe it is a very good license for new startups in this space. https://itsfoss.com/making-the-business-source-license-open-source-compliant/ https://itsfoss.com/making-the-business-source-license-open-...
    - dljsjr 6y ago
      I have no beef w/ the BSL. I think it's a great license. It's just not quite open source is all.
strzibny 6y ago
I made a list a while ago when I was making the decision[0]. I started on Fathom and moved to Plausible. [0] https://nts.strzibny.name/privacy-oriented-alternatives-to-google-analytics/ https://nts.strzibny.name/privacy-oriented-alternatives-to-g...

pul 6y ago

I've been using Plausible for https://www.nslookup.io https://www.nslookup.io for about a month now. I can definitely recommend it over Google Analytics. Simpler, more intuitive and privacy first. However, at some point I'd like to monetize this site. I know there's https://www.ethicalads.io/ https://www.ethicalads.io/, but they've limited their target audience to developers. Are there any privacy focused ad networks?

forsaken 6y ago
NSLookup definitely looks like a fit for us at EthicalAds. You can ping me at the email in my bio and we can get you signed up.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
markosaric 6y ago
thank you! it's great to see some more ethical alternatives available for site owners

talolard 6y ago

Question for OP Can you share how you manage the borders between the open source product and the infrastructure for offering a SaaS As a trivial example, I’m assuming youre using plausible in plausible, do you have protections ensuring secrets don’t leak to the open source for history ?

ukutaht 6y ago
Sure, our main repository comes with a production-ready Dockerfile: https://github.com/plausible/analytics https://github.com/plausible/analytics We also have a separate repository with examples and code for how to host Plausible Analytics with docker-compose: https://github.com/plausible/hosting https://github.com/plausible/hosting The hosting repo includes everything you need including databases, MaxMind GeoIP database, reverse proxy for SSL, etc. We don't host with docker-compose ourselves because we want to scale our databases independently from the app server. I'm not sure I understand your question. Secrets should never be committed to source control, whether the repo is public or not. Being open source does not change how we manage secrets in the slightest. Does that answer your question?

crazypython 6y ago

GNU argues that you should not use MIT or LGPLv3 for your library, because then the library will be used in proprietary software to oppress and tyrant people, possibly including yourself. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-not-lgpl.html https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-not-lgpl.html

mrmonkeyman 6y ago
Oppression is highly profitable. 1. Live in a cardboard box under a bridge being shanked to death by a fellow hobo 2. Sail around the world on yachts surrounded by scandily clad supermodels. Choose wisely.

jamil7 6y ago

I've been running Plausible for two of my sites on a Dokku instance for the last few months. I would highly recommend it to anyone who wants some simple metrics without invading people's privacy.

markosaric 6y ago
thanks! glad you're enjoying Plausible!

gmanis 6y ago

Love plausible analytics. Upgraded to a paid plan for my project which is getting some traction and I was able to get exactly the kind of analytics I was looking for. I also share similar principles with regards to user privacy and so it’s definitely something I want people to use more and advocate for. Great work folks.

markosaric 6y ago
thank you for your support!

WealthVsSurvive 6y ago

Open source is not the antidote to surveillance capitalism. Something like this, however, is: https://anonymous.4open.science/r/e85a54a3-983d-498c-8672-0aa120fcfce2/ https://anonymous.4open.science/r/e85a54a3-983d-498c-8672-0a...

remram 6y ago
> The person or entity is not engaged in commercial use of the Software This make it seem you can't use the software at all, even if your company satisfies their conditions.

simplehuman 6y ago

I am impressed with your business but the open source development model is worrying. Why not release as normally as you would in your SaaS? It's fine if this is the invisible "hook" where you get an unstable product if you self-host(and from the outside, it seems that's what this is). also, fathom also has pretty much stopped all development :/.

markosaric 6y ago
thanks! all our code is still on github so you could just download the "testing" version we use on the cloud and run that. the slower schedule of the official "stable" self-hosted release is to simply make it possible for us to make it work. we're a two person team and because of the popularity of the product, we've become overwhelmed with support requests from self-hosters and needed to make a change in the expectations and the process

jabo 6y ago

I’m working on an open source search alternative to Algolia, called Typesense [1], with a hosted SaaS option [2]. So our business model is very similar to Plausible. re: OSS licensing, we use GPL and have been very hesitant about using something like AGPL. I’ve personally seen developers not use projects only because they’re AGPL. Even GPL seems to scare some developers. Question for HN: have you recently wanted to use an OSS project in your stack and then stayed away from using it only because of its license? If so, what license was it and what about the license prevented you from using it? [1] https://github.com/typesense/typesense https://github.com/typesense/typesense [2] https://cloud.typesense.org https://cloud.typesense.org

blendergeek 6y ago
> re: OSS licensing, we use GPL and have been very hesitant about using something like AGPL. I’ve personally seen developers not use projects only because they’re AGPL. Even GPL seems to scare some developers. Do you think it is more likely to scare your potential paying customers, your potential contributors, or potential freeloaders? I expect that is likely to scare people in this order: 1. Freeloaders 2. Contributors 3. Customers If I have a Free Software project, I want to scare freeloaders while still welcoming potential customers and contributors. I know its a balancing act, but I like the AGPL.
- jabo 6y ago
  Unfortunately it seems to scare people in all those categories. People typically start using it for free and over time, some of them become contributors and/or paying customers. So if a license scares the people who start using it for free, it then inherently hurts contributions and customers long term.
- TAForObvReasons 6y ago
  The order is closer to 1. Contributors 2. Customers 3. Freeloaders The type of person who is likely to contribute will be the first to look at the license, and AGPL will rightfully worry them. For the open source funnel, the potential customers start off as "freeloaders". They are more likely to look at the license in the first place because they are more likely to be using the software in a commercial setting and have to worry about licensing. The AGPL concerns hit them first. The freeloaders will just switch over to a more liberally licensed project.

shafyy 6y ago

I've been using Plausible for almost a month now and I love it. Previously, I have been using Simple Analytics, which is also great from a privacy perspective. But I personally just like Plausible more because it's open source, self-hostable (although I currently don't) and has better UX/UI.

luord 6y ago

> There’s no longer any guarantee that, we as creators of Plausible, will be able to help out with your self-hosting issues [...] be prepared to troubleshoot your issues, read our documentation or get community support in the forum. This is sane, and how most other open source applications or tools work. Don't see any reason why this one should be different.

markosaric 6y ago
thanks! perhaps because we're new to open source maintenance, but early on we tried to help each and every support request from self-hosters and it quickly turned out an impossible task. we do help every paying subscriber so tried to do the same for self-hosters but unfortunately it gets very difficult with our limited resources. so now we're simply setting expectations straight so people know what they can or cannot expect

mike31fr 6y ago

I had never considered that a paying SaaS could be open source and that raises some questions to me, like: 1. Why would people pay instead of just downloading your code and running it for free? 2. Couldn't anyone grab your code, tweak the UI to make it look different and then sell it as their own SaaS which would be your competitor taking some market share away from you with your own code?

mixmastamyk 6y ago
1. Most folks interested in a saas probably don't want to host it themselves. 2. Code needs maintenance and expertise to run. Could you download the source of a large app and compete against it profitably? Maybe if it were mature, well documented, and longtime contributors hired.