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Redis, Elasticsearch, Mongo and now WordPress - it seems that Open source is as good and only good when you and only you can sell it. The moment someone else st

by wg0 2y ago

Redis, Elasticsearch, Mongo and now WordPress - it seems that Open source is as good and only good when you and only you can sell it. The moment someone else starts to make money or more money then you could have off your effort, does things better than you to market/host/package your open source project, the moment things to start to fall apart. None of the Open source ethos survive of sharing together, learning together etc. EDIT: typos

batuhanicoz 2y ago
WordPress has been around for a long time, and there is no change to how open it is. It is GPL code, Automattic is not forking it and selling access to the fork. We are just asking WP Engine to contribute back to the project that they are basing their entire business on. This is primarily a trademark infringement issue, we asked them to give back to be able to use the trademark we have the license for.
- DonnieBurger 2y ago
  Are you going to be "just asking" other businesses as well? Or does it only apply to competitors of Automattic?
  - batuhanicoz 2y ago
    As long as competitors of Automattic does not infringe on the trademarks owned (in the case of WooCommerce) or licensed (WordPress) by Automattic, I don't see any reason for us taking any action. I would personally ask everyone to at least try to contribute back to the open source projects they rely on though.
    - prox 2y ago
      Honestly I tried at one point, but the community was rather hostile and unwelcoming. I help out with Godot sometimes and it’s far more welcoming and low friction.
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  > This is primarily a trademark infringement issue… There’s a pretty standard way of fighting those out.
jeswin 2y ago
> The moment someone else starts to make money or more money then you could have off your effort Company A spends X% of their revenue on improving the product. Company B spends nothing. Company B will be able to price their product lower, and take Company A's customers. It's not sustainable. The solution is to ask Company B to pay up (in cash or resources), and not be leeching.
- surgical_fire 2y ago
  > Company A spends X% of their revenue on improving the product. Company B spends nothing. Company B will be able to price their product lower, and take Company A's customers. It's not sustainable. Then don't make an open source product. What you can't do is try to earn the goodwill that comes with open source, but also expect the profitability of a proprietary product.
  - Spivak 2y ago
    Don't try to base a company around developing and selling open source is a lesson that folks will keep learning again and again. You have to make money doing something else and if your core competency isn't that something else you'll lose to someone where it is. If you want to sell software then sell software.
- snowwrestler 2y ago
  WP Engine is not winning because it’s cheaper. It is a better product than what Automattic offers. That’s why this action by Matt is ridiculous. WP Engine has grown the overall WP market through good product development and investment. That has produced positive effects for the many companies and people who make their money developing and supporting WP sites for clients.
TheHippo 2y ago
It is not about the code. It is about using other company's server resources.
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  But they're OK with the use of those resources if WP Engine contributes more code, which makes it... at least partially about the code?
pxtail 2y ago
> None of the Open source ethos survive of sharing together, learning together etc. Could be because of that missing part of "sharing together" replaced with "taking and not giving back anything in return"
- fortyseven 2y ago
  Ethically it may be the right thing to do, but there is no obligation to do so unless it's in the license. If you want to thumb your nose at WPEngine for that, fine, but that's about as far as that goes.
petercooper 2y ago
Postgres, notably, has not had these problems. There's a thriving ecosystem, despite the trademark, and many providers offer "Postgres" services without Postgres' core organizations or contributors getting their undies in a twist over it.
- evanelias 2y ago
  That's largely true, but there definitely have been incidents/drama in the recent past. Two that come to mind: https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/statement-from-the-postgresql-core-team-on-the-edb-acquisition-of-2ndquadrant-2094/ https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/statement-from-the-pos... https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/trademark-actions-against-the-postgresql-community-2302/ https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/trademark-actions-agai... Also worth considering that EDB is backed by Private Equity, and there was some other very recent incident that seemingly directly resulted in OtterTune folding.
- mdasen 2y ago
  I think a difference there is that Postgres doesn't have a for-profit semi-attached to it. There are certainly companies that do work on Postgres, but Postgres wasn't founded by people looking to make a business and its development isn't driven by one primary company (to my knowledge). Postgres started as an academic research project by Turing Award winner Michael Stonebraker. Berkeley released it under a BSD/MIT-like license. It just has a long history of being independent of any company that's the primary driver of its evolution. That's not to say there aren't companies like EnterpriseDB, Neon, Citus, and others that haven't driven certain aspects of it, but they just don't get the same kind of control over the project. Crucially, no one can really feel like someone else is making money off a project that's primarily their work. I think companies in the Postgres ecosystem all understand that even if they're a big fish in the Postgres ecosystem, they aren't coming anywhere close to having built 25% of the value in Postgres. It's hard to "get your undies in a twist" if you acknowledge that you've probably gotten more from the historical contributions than you've contributed - even if you're a stellar contributor today.

by wg0 2y ago

batuhanicoz 2y ago

WordPress has been around for a long time, and there is no change to how open it is. It is GPL code, Automattic is not forking it and selling access to the fork. We are just asking WP Engine to contribute back to the project that they are basing their entire business on. This is primarily a trademark infringement issue, we asked them to give back to be able to use the trademark we have the license for.

DonnieBurger 2y ago
Are you going to be "just asking" other businesses as well? Or does it only apply to competitors of Automattic?
- batuhanicoz 2y ago
  As long as competitors of Automattic does not infringe on the trademarks owned (in the case of WooCommerce) or licensed (WordPress) by Automattic, I don't see any reason for us taking any action. I would personally ask everyone to at least try to contribute back to the open source projects they rely on though.
  - prox 2y ago
    Honestly I tried at one point, but the community was rather hostile and unwelcoming. I help out with Godot sometimes and it’s far more welcoming and low friction.
ceejayoz 2y ago
> This is primarily a trademark infringement issue… There’s a pretty standard way of fighting those out.

jeswin 2y ago

> The moment someone else starts to make money or more money then you could have off your effort Company A spends X% of their revenue on improving the product. Company B spends nothing. Company B will be able to price their product lower, and take Company A's customers. It's not sustainable. The solution is to ask Company B to pay up (in cash or resources), and not be leeching.

surgical_fire 2y ago
> Company A spends X% of their revenue on improving the product. Company B spends nothing. Company B will be able to price their product lower, and take Company A's customers. It's not sustainable. Then don't make an open source product. What you can't do is try to earn the goodwill that comes with open source, but also expect the profitability of a proprietary product.
- Spivak 2y ago
  Don't try to base a company around developing and selling open source is a lesson that folks will keep learning again and again. You have to make money doing something else and if your core competency isn't that something else you'll lose to someone where it is. If you want to sell software then sell software.
snowwrestler 2y ago
WP Engine is not winning because it’s cheaper. It is a better product than what Automattic offers. That’s why this action by Matt is ridiculous. WP Engine has grown the overall WP market through good product development and investment. That has produced positive effects for the many companies and people who make their money developing and supporting WP sites for clients.

TheHippo 2y ago

It is not about the code. It is about using other company's server resources.

ceejayoz 2y ago
But they're OK with the use of those resources if WP Engine contributes more code, which makes it... at least partially about the code?

pxtail 2y ago

> None of the Open source ethos survive of sharing together, learning together etc. Could be because of that missing part of "sharing together" replaced with "taking and not giving back anything in return"

fortyseven 2y ago
Ethically it may be the right thing to do, but there is no obligation to do so unless it's in the license. If you want to thumb your nose at WPEngine for that, fine, but that's about as far as that goes.

petercooper 2y ago

Postgres, notably, has not had these problems. There's a thriving ecosystem, despite the trademark, and many providers offer "Postgres" services without Postgres' core organizations or contributors getting their undies in a twist over it.

evanelias 2y ago
That's largely true, but there definitely have been incidents/drama in the recent past. Two that come to mind: https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/statement-from-the-postgresql-core-team-on-the-edb-acquisition-of-2ndquadrant-2094/ https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/statement-from-the-pos... https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/trademark-actions-against-the-postgresql-community-2302/ https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/trademark-actions-agai... Also worth considering that EDB is backed by Private Equity, and there was some other very recent incident that seemingly directly resulted in OtterTune folding.
mdasen 2y ago
I think a difference there is that Postgres doesn't have a for-profit semi-attached to it. There are certainly companies that do work on Postgres, but Postgres wasn't founded by people looking to make a business and its development isn't driven by one primary company (to my knowledge). Postgres started as an academic research project by Turing Award winner Michael Stonebraker. Berkeley released it under a BSD/MIT-like license. It just has a long history of being independent of any company that's the primary driver of its evolution. That's not to say there aren't companies like EnterpriseDB, Neon, Citus, and others that haven't driven certain aspects of it, but they just don't get the same kind of control over the project. Crucially, no one can really feel like someone else is making money off a project that's primarily their work. I think companies in the Postgres ecosystem all understand that even if they're a big fish in the Postgres ecosystem, they aren't coming anywhere close to having built 25% of the value in Postgres. It's hard to "get your undies in a twist" if you acknowledge that you've probably gotten more from the historical contributions than you've contributed - even if you're a stellar contributor today.