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Open source advocates love to point to Red Hat as a shining example of how software development around open source can lead to a successful business model. Unfo

Open source advocates love to point to Red Hat as a shining example of how software development around open source can lead to a successful business model. Unfortunately, it is an outlier instead of proof it works for the majority (or even a significant minority). If simply releasing your source to the public lead to monetary success (or even sustainability) then there would be hundreds or thousands of other 'Red Hat examples' out there.

MichaelCollins 4y ago
Simply hiding your source does not lead to success either. Anybody can hide their source, but only some people succeed in starting software businesses. I don't think anybody claimed "simply releasing your source to the public [will] lead to monetary success"
- didgetmaster 4y ago
  I have a software project that I am considering open sourcing. I have people tell me all the time 'just open source it!' as if money just magically appears in your bank account after doing so. Making good software is hard. Making it profitable is also hard and open source is not some magic bullet. Most advocates for it are also realistic, but there are enough out there who seem convinced that it somehow is.
  - vidbina 4y ago
    I share the pain of musing over license options. From a pure business perspective, I feel like there are more data points out there that have won (as in, "survived") by shipping proprietary software. Don't want to make moral judgements here about proprietary-vs-FLOSS but within my hacker bubbles, one biases themselves to be partial to FLOSS very easily. If I were to ship "some things" (it really depends what the thing is) as proprietary, this community may not take too kindly to that move (and neither may I). On the other hand, I don't think that the world at large really cares. Sometimes it feels that one can either be a) financially well off or b) more beloved by the hacker community. These things are not mutually exclusive like that but the union of these is rather rare. Hard choices!
    - didgetmaster 4y ago
      Speaking of license options, even if you decide to release all your code as open source, there are so many options to choose from. I counted 116 different open source licenses that are currently 'blessed' by OSI: https://opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical https://opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical How do you pick the 'right one' for your project that you won't regret later on?
      - MichaelCollins 4y ago
        Look at what other similar projects have been doing, and if it's been working out well enough for them. And if you are the sole copyright owner, you're not locked into your choice. You can either refuse community contributions or make them sign over the copyright to you. Then you're free to distribute your software under another license going further. Proprietary software doesn't save you from having to make decisions like this. Proprietary software can be licenced under many different terms. Are you going to sell perpetual per-seat licenses? Subscriptions? Selling updates? Support contracts? Avoiding future regret is always going to be a speculative affair.
subpixel 4y ago
Red Hat didn't create a new thing from whole cloth, open source it, and prosper. They spotted an opportunity to sell a version of an open source thing to commercial customers. This, in turn, made product development out of what looks on the surface like open source contribution. That worked really well for Red Hat, but the wrong lesson to take away is that there is big money in open sourcing software.

MichaelCollins 4y ago

Simply hiding your source does not lead to success either. Anybody can hide their source, but only some people succeed in starting software businesses. I don't think anybody claimed "simply releasing your source to the public [will] lead to monetary success"

didgetmaster 4y ago
I have a software project that I am considering open sourcing. I have people tell me all the time 'just open source it!' as if money just magically appears in your bank account after doing so. Making good software is hard. Making it profitable is also hard and open source is not some magic bullet. Most advocates for it are also realistic, but there are enough out there who seem convinced that it somehow is.
- vidbina 4y ago
  I share the pain of musing over license options. From a pure business perspective, I feel like there are more data points out there that have won (as in, "survived") by shipping proprietary software. Don't want to make moral judgements here about proprietary-vs-FLOSS but within my hacker bubbles, one biases themselves to be partial to FLOSS very easily. If I were to ship "some things" (it really depends what the thing is) as proprietary, this community may not take too kindly to that move (and neither may I). On the other hand, I don't think that the world at large really cares. Sometimes it feels that one can either be a) financially well off or b) more beloved by the hacker community. These things are not mutually exclusive like that but the union of these is rather rare. Hard choices!
  - didgetmaster 4y ago
    Speaking of license options, even if you decide to release all your code as open source, there are so many options to choose from. I counted 116 different open source licenses that are currently 'blessed' by OSI: https://opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical https://opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical How do you pick the 'right one' for your project that you won't regret later on?
    - MichaelCollins 4y ago
      Look at what other similar projects have been doing, and if it's been working out well enough for them. And if you are the sole copyright owner, you're not locked into your choice. You can either refuse community contributions or make them sign over the copyright to you. Then you're free to distribute your software under another license going further. Proprietary software doesn't save you from having to make decisions like this. Proprietary software can be licenced under many different terms. Are you going to sell perpetual per-seat licenses? Subscriptions? Selling updates? Support contracts? Avoiding future regret is always going to be a speculative affair.

subpixel 4y ago

Red Hat didn't create a new thing from whole cloth, open source it, and prosper. They spotted an opportunity to sell a version of an open source thing to commercial customers. This, in turn, made product development out of what looks on the surface like open source contribution. That worked really well for Red Hat, but the wrong lesson to take away is that there is big money in open sourcing software.