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Then the community forks the OSS project and you lose control/struggle to maintain parity/mindshare. Gogs/Gitea, VIM/Neovim, Bitwarden/Vaultwarden... The ones

Then the community forks the OSS project and you lose control/struggle to maintain parity/mindshare. Gogs/Gitea, VIM/Neovim, Bitwarden/Vaultwarden... The ones that succeed keep the community happy and either focus on adding value on top (open core, don't give away the special sauce) or deliver half assed products (package up the community leftovers and hope support contracts/services fill in the gaps).

smoldesu 5y ago
> Then the community forks the OSS project and you lose control/struggle to maintain parity/mindshare That shouldn't matter if you're making a superior product.
- monsieurbanana 5y ago
  Well, yeah. So what's in it for them?
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    Free QA/testing, a community of users who can submit patches, word-of-mouth marketing, a large install-base, opportunity to sell support to high-value clients.
    - monsieurbanana 5y ago
      What's in it for them, if it turns out the community forks their project and do it better than them? I don't see it as a sound argument.
jdauriemma 5y ago
Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t there open source licenses that don’t permit unauthorized distribution? If so, couldn’t they safely release the source code without worrying about competition from forks?
- throwaway19937 5y ago
  > Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t there open source licenses that don’t permit unauthorized distribution? If so, couldn’t they safely release the source code without worrying about competition from forks? They would still be faced with knock-offs that either copy code or violate the license; Paint.net (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paint.net#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paint.net#History) is an example of this happening for an open source project.
- mkl 5y ago
  That would be shared source, not open source. Disallowing unauthorised distribution contradicts the definition of "open source".

smoldesu 5y ago

> Then the community forks the OSS project and you lose control/struggle to maintain parity/mindshare That shouldn't matter if you're making a superior product.

monsieurbanana 5y ago
Well, yeah. So what's in it for them?
- smoldesu 5y ago
  Free QA/testing, a community of users who can submit patches, word-of-mouth marketing, a large install-base, opportunity to sell support to high-value clients.
  - monsieurbanana 5y ago
    What's in it for them, if it turns out the community forks their project and do it better than them? I don't see it as a sound argument.

jdauriemma 5y ago

Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t there open source licenses that don’t permit unauthorized distribution? If so, couldn’t they safely release the source code without worrying about competition from forks?

throwaway19937 5y ago
> Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t there open source licenses that don’t permit unauthorized distribution? If so, couldn’t they safely release the source code without worrying about competition from forks? They would still be faced with knock-offs that either copy code or violate the license; Paint.net (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paint.net#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paint.net#History) is an example of this happening for an open source project.
mkl 5y ago
That would be shared source, not open source. Disallowing unauthorised distribution contradicts the definition of "open source".