5 ms·

This is why it is good to build on the top of open source solutions

solardev 3y ago
Does that really help? Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over (if they didn't develop it to begin with). I wonder if it's less about the source code here but about the people involved, and how to prevent a consolidation of capital and power in the hands of greedy financiers. Maybe developing the projects as nonprofits (like Blender or Mozilla), or at least employee co-ownership rather than VC money or institutional funders? If only the laid off FAANGers could pool their fat checks and start up something employee-driven and not subject to outside influences, in the style of Valve or similar. And preferably with legal protections against "selling out".
- nottorp 3y ago
  > Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over Except you can fork the last open source version and continue as before. See ... mariadb?
  - linkdd 3y ago
    MariaDB, OpenTofu, etc... Those are the exceptions. Forking is easy. Maintaining a fork, keeping the quality and innovation alive, and the community involved is hard. There are many more failed forks than successful forks. So saying "you can fork" is utopist at best. Sure you can, but you'll probably be the only one maintaining it and it will slowly rot as there won't be a community to keep it bug-free and compatible with new hardware/standards.
    - nottorp 3y ago
      However that doesn't matter when you have an existing game title already in the market. You just maintain your title, which you need to do anyway.
    - amrocha 3y ago
      The idea is that the community decides on a fork and maintainers move over. Are those really the exception? Do we have examples of large projects that made a monetization TOS change and didn't immediately get forked? The only one I can think of is Docker maybe?
      - nani8ot 3y ago
        Audacity made some bad decisions but the forks never got anywhere. That said, this particular issue was blown out of proportion, so the forks going nowhere isn't an issue.
    - xmprt 3y ago
      I think it's a self regulating system. If the product was so important and so many people relied on it (eg. Unity) where a cash grab by the Unity development team results in the entire community considering switching to a completely different product (eg. Godot), then I'm sure the community would rather fork the existing product and make it better. On the other hand, if the product wasn't that important or the cash grab wasn't that bad, then fewer people will be likely to fork and the current product will continue to be the mainline. Open source gives users more options which is always better.
    - throw0101c 3y ago
      > Forking is easy. Maintaining a fork, keeping the quality and innovation alive, and the community involved is hard. LibreOffice is doing pretty well compared to OpenOffice: * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37645160 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37645160 EGCS was eventually merged back into GCC (or rather it became the new GCC?). I don't pay attention recently, but XEmacs was/is pretty active along with Emacs.
      - linkdd 3y ago
        More anecdotal examples of "survivor's bias" do not dismiss the initial argument.
        mcv 3y ago
        I haven't seen any evidence in support of the original argument, though. Which open source projects have been killed explicitly by Big Tech that they didn't originally create? Microsoft spent ages trying to kill Linux but never succeeded.
    - wolverine876 3y ago
      > Maintaining a fork, keeping the quality and innovation alive, and the community involved is hard. It's hard, but the FOSS model has a long, successful history at this point.
    - OkayPhysicist 3y ago
      You don't need to innovate on the foundation of your product. It's a game engine: If it fulfilled your needs when you started, it's fulfilling your needs now. With open-source solutions A) you can't have the rug pulled from under you, as you have a perpetual license, and B) you can fix/modify/add things yourself if the business needs arise. With a proprietary solution, you might get A, but you have zero hope of B. It's an objectively worse proposition.
      - linkdd 3y ago
        If my business is making games, I don't want to fix/modify/add things to a game engine. You do need to innovate on the foundation if you plan to maintain your game long term: new consoles support, new hardware support, obsolescence of old platforms, etc... You do not need to innovate if you plan to let your game rot and become unplayable 10-20 years later. Yes having a FOSS solution for the foundation would be ideal. That was not the topic of the discussion. The topic was about the claim "we can fork if we're not in agreement". No, as a game developer you won't be forking and maintaining a game engine. No a "just fork it" is not a viable solution in the majority of cases as you need a strong community behind you and your fork to make it last long term and not rot after 2 weeks.
        danparsonson 3y ago
        Actually it's quite common for game dev studios to make custom mods to engines (source code to Unreal engine available here for example: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/ue-on-github https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/ue-on-github). The idea with forking an open source engine as a game dev would not necessarily be to maintain it for the community, but to bring it in house and ensure continuity for your own projects.
        linkdd 3y ago
        That's fair, but if we consider the amount of game dev studio that have the resources (time and money) to do that, versus the amount of indie game devs and small studio who do not, I'm not sure that it's fair to say "you can just fork it". The examples of successful forks are anecdotal, they are the exceptions not the rule. This is survivor's bias.
    - plagiarist 3y ago
      What are some examples of open source projects that were taken over and the licensing modified where no successful fork managed to emerge?
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- fooqux 3y ago
  > Does that really help? Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over (if they didn't develop it to begin with). Of course it can help. For example, when Oracle bought MySQL, it was forked and we got Maria. When Emby pissed off people, it was forked and we got Jellyfin. There are plenty of other examples. Whether or not you like these products, the point is that open source gives the community the ability to continue development if the original project gets bought and/or otherwise changes its philosophy for the worse.
  - Modified3019 3y ago
    OpenZFS is another great example.
    - wiktor-k 3y ago
      Also OpenTofu (Terraform).
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over (if they didn't develop it to begin with). True, but there's no rule that says you have to update when they do. You can just stick with what you have until/unless you find or create another option.
jameshart 3y ago
Great advice… Unless you’re a game studio who wants to ship on PlayStation and Switch some day. If you want to build on an engine that lets you target proprietary platforms your options are, in practice, limited.
- amrocha 3y ago
  Are open source tools banned on playstation and switch?
  - cableshaft 3y ago
    Not banned, just that every build platform has to be supported and not every open source project prioritizes each platform. Godot, for example, doesn't support console builds, only working with a third party to facilitate porting to those platforms (that may change in the future now that they're getting a lot more support from the community after all this).
    - amrocha 3y ago
      Gotcha, so it's not that open source isn't possible, the industry just needs to invest in community support for an engine
    - follower 3y ago
      > Godot, for example, doesn't support console builds, only working with a third party to facilitate porting to those platforms For the full nuanced details I've listed the relevant links here: * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37649430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37649430
      - amrocha 3y ago
        That's a really useful comment, thank you!
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
bmitc 3y ago
Open source solutions are not a magical solution to every problem. Open source solutions are often, if not more so, subject to the whims of just a few people.
d3w4s9 3y ago
Ah, these comments again. Open source is great and I have my self contributed to several open source projects, but it is not the solution to everything. Products like Word/Excel/PowerPoint/etc, Visual Studio, Photoshop, Figma, Windows and Mac all have many open source alternatives, but the fact that these products and companies have been hugely successfully and continue to do so says something -- commercial companies can organize and reward work in a way hardly found in open source projects, and their products often provide added value (more features/specific support for certain workflows/professionally designed UX/product support etc) that can be rare or nonexistent in open source projects. For some thing that is as complicated as a game engine, maybe there is a reason open source solutions are not mainstream yet.

Does that really help? Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over (if they didn't develop it to begin with). I wonder if it's less about the source code here but about the people involved, and how to prevent a consolidation of capital and power in the hands of greedy financiers. Maybe developing the projects as nonprofits (like Blender or Mozilla), or at least employee co-ownership rather than VC money or institutional funders? If only the laid off FAANGers could pool their fat checks and start up something employee-driven and not subject to outside influences, in the style of Valve or similar. And preferably with legal protections against "selling out".

nottorp 3y ago
> Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over Except you can fork the last open source version and continue as before. See ... mariadb?
- linkdd 3y ago
  MariaDB, OpenTofu, etc... Those are the exceptions. Forking is easy. Maintaining a fork, keeping the quality and innovation alive, and the community involved is hard. There are many more failed forks than successful forks. So saying "you can fork" is utopist at best. Sure you can, but you'll probably be the only one maintaining it and it will slowly rot as there won't be a community to keep it bug-free and compatible with new hardware/standards.
  - nottorp 3y ago
    However that doesn't matter when you have an existing game title already in the market. You just maintain your title, which you need to do anyway.
  - amrocha 3y ago
    The idea is that the community decides on a fork and maintainers move over. Are those really the exception? Do we have examples of large projects that made a monetization TOS change and didn't immediately get forked? The only one I can think of is Docker maybe?
    - nani8ot 3y ago
      Audacity made some bad decisions but the forks never got anywhere. That said, this particular issue was blown out of proportion, so the forks going nowhere isn't an issue.
  - xmprt 3y ago
    I think it's a self regulating system. If the product was so important and so many people relied on it (eg. Unity) where a cash grab by the Unity development team results in the entire community considering switching to a completely different product (eg. Godot), then I'm sure the community would rather fork the existing product and make it better. On the other hand, if the product wasn't that important or the cash grab wasn't that bad, then fewer people will be likely to fork and the current product will continue to be the mainline. Open source gives users more options which is always better.
  - throw0101c 3y ago
    > Forking is easy. Maintaining a fork, keeping the quality and innovation alive, and the community involved is hard. LibreOffice is doing pretty well compared to OpenOffice: * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37645160 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37645160 EGCS was eventually merged back into GCC (or rather it became the new GCC?). I don't pay attention recently, but XEmacs was/is pretty active along with Emacs.
    - linkdd 3y ago
      More anecdotal examples of "survivor's bias" do not dismiss the initial argument.
      - mcv 3y ago
        I haven't seen any evidence in support of the original argument, though. Which open source projects have been killed explicitly by Big Tech that they didn't originally create? Microsoft spent ages trying to kill Linux but never succeeded.
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    > Maintaining a fork, keeping the quality and innovation alive, and the community involved is hard. It's hard, but the FOSS model has a long, successful history at this point.
  - OkayPhysicist 3y ago
    You don't need to innovate on the foundation of your product. It's a game engine: If it fulfilled your needs when you started, it's fulfilling your needs now. With open-source solutions A) you can't have the rug pulled from under you, as you have a perpetual license, and B) you can fix/modify/add things yourself if the business needs arise. With a proprietary solution, you might get A, but you have zero hope of B. It's an objectively worse proposition.
    - linkdd 3y ago
      If my business is making games, I don't want to fix/modify/add things to a game engine. You do need to innovate on the foundation if you plan to maintain your game long term: new consoles support, new hardware support, obsolescence of old platforms, etc... You do not need to innovate if you plan to let your game rot and become unplayable 10-20 years later. Yes having a FOSS solution for the foundation would be ideal. That was not the topic of the discussion. The topic was about the claim "we can fork if we're not in agreement". No, as a game developer you won't be forking and maintaining a game engine. No a "just fork it" is not a viable solution in the majority of cases as you need a strong community behind you and your fork to make it last long term and not rot after 2 weeks.
      - danparsonson 3y ago
        Actually it's quite common for game dev studios to make custom mods to engines (source code to Unreal engine available here for example: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/ue-on-github https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/ue-on-github). The idea with forking an open source engine as a game dev would not necessarily be to maintain it for the community, but to bring it in house and ensure continuity for your own projects.
        linkdd 3y ago
        That's fair, but if we consider the amount of game dev studio that have the resources (time and money) to do that, versus the amount of indie game devs and small studio who do not, I'm not sure that it's fair to say "you can just fork it". The examples of successful forks are anecdotal, they are the exceptions not the rule. This is survivor's bias.
  - plagiarist 3y ago
    What are some examples of open source projects that were taken over and the licensing modified where no successful fork managed to emerge?
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
fooqux 3y ago
> Does that really help? Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over (if they didn't develop it to begin with). Of course it can help. For example, when Oracle bought MySQL, it was forked and we got Maria. When Emby pissed off people, it was forked and we got Jellyfin. There are plenty of other examples. Whether or not you like these products, the point is that open source gives the community the ability to continue development if the original project gets bought and/or otherwise changes its philosophy for the worse.
- Modified3019 3y ago
  OpenZFS is another great example.
  - wiktor-k 3y ago
    Also OpenTofu (Terraform).
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
JohnFen 3y ago
> Even when open-source, it's only a matter of time before an Oracle or Google or Microsoft or Meta takes it over (if they didn't develop it to begin with). True, but there's no rule that says you have to update when they do. You can just stick with what you have until/unless you find or create another option.

jameshart 3y ago

Great advice… Unless you’re a game studio who wants to ship on PlayStation and Switch some day. If you want to build on an engine that lets you target proprietary platforms your options are, in practice, limited.

amrocha 3y ago
Are open source tools banned on playstation and switch?
- cableshaft 3y ago
  Not banned, just that every build platform has to be supported and not every open source project prioritizes each platform. Godot, for example, doesn't support console builds, only working with a third party to facilitate porting to those platforms (that may change in the future now that they're getting a lot more support from the community after all this).
  - amrocha 3y ago
    Gotcha, so it's not that open source isn't possible, the industry just needs to invest in community support for an engine
  - follower 3y ago
    > Godot, for example, doesn't support console builds, only working with a third party to facilitate porting to those platforms For the full nuanced details I've listed the relevant links here: * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37649430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37649430
    - amrocha 3y ago
      That's a really useful comment, thank you!
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

bmitc 3y ago

Open source solutions are not a magical solution to every problem. Open source solutions are often, if not more so, subject to the whims of just a few people.

d3w4s9 3y ago

Ah, these comments again. Open source is great and I have my self contributed to several open source projects, but it is not the solution to everything. Products like Word/Excel/PowerPoint/etc, Visual Studio, Photoshop, Figma, Windows and Mac all have many open source alternatives, but the fact that these products and companies have been hugely successfully and continue to do so says something -- commercial companies can organize and reward work in a way hardly found in open source projects, and their products often provide added value (more features/specific support for certain workflows/professionally designed UX/product support etc) that can be rare or nonexistent in open source projects. For some thing that is as complicated as a game engine, maybe there is a reason open source solutions are not mainstream yet.