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How are Docker monetizing their product? Is it just in hosting and support? By open sourcing Docker they have opened up the door to hundreds of competitors offe

by weavie 12y ago

How are Docker monetizing their product? Is it just in hosting and support? By open sourcing Docker they have opened up the door to hundreds of competitors offering the same thing, often for a much lower cost? Is their only competitive advantage the fact that they own the project and thus understand it better and can dictate its course? I'm sure they would make for a very interesting case study on how to do open source right.

netcan 12y ago
Leaving aside some of the macro debating points on open source business models, I'm curious how often this kind of competition has ever become a problem for businesses. Docker aren't the first to create a business around open source software they develop. Has this ever killed a business before?
- davidw 12y ago
  > Has this ever killed a business before? I think there have been some companies that have died that way, yeah. It's tough to make money from open source, if obviously not impossible. Think how hard it is to get a regular old sell-something-for-money business off the ground, then throw in a way more complicated business model and relationships with community, customers and so on.... it's complicated!
- nickstinemates 12y ago
  I would look at something like MySQL vs. MariaDB vs. ... as soon as the main shepherd of the project has shown not to have the best interest of the community and ecosystem in mind, a prominent fork gets adopted. It definitely takes time.
why-el 12y ago
Docker are doing nothing new. There are few million to a billion dollar open source businesses out there (Red Hat is leading).
rtkwe 12y ago
The main way companies building or built around open source products make money is through services and expertise. Companies like Cloudera and RedHat are two prime examples, they're both built around open source projects but still make excellent money because of their service and support abilities.
- weavie 12y ago
  True. However, Linux and Hadoop are very complex beasts that really require and benefit from a lot of expertise when deployed in the enterprise. Perhaps I don't fully understand Docker, but really there isn't that much to it. Its a great product and massively useful, but does it really require that extensive knowledge to make the most of it? Docker is really just an extra layer over LXC..
  - nickstinemates 12y ago
    > Docker is really just an extra layer over LXC This is not correct. The Docker engine has an ability to use LXC userland tools as an execution environment, but it is not the primary choice. libcontainer (github.com/docker/libcontainer) is. libcontainer has adoption outside of the Docker world (Parallels, CloudFoundry, as examples) which we find to be a fundamentally good thing. We can also spend time talking about the non-technical values of Docker, if you'd like to jump in to that.
    - weavie 12y ago
      Ah, thanks for putting me straight. Yes, please expound. I am largely just a lone developer looking to use docker for my fairly small projects. I currently just use Git for deployment. Is there any value to moving to Docker?
    - tinco 12y ago
      Would you say libcontainer is a reimplementation of LXC? Are they related in the sense that they use the same kernel features with the same goal of isolating processes?
nickstinemates 12y ago
I'll paraphrase the questions and provide answers best I can > How are Docker monetizing their product? We offer commercial support for Docker and also offer paid features on Docker Hub. > Competition? Docker is Apache 2 licensed. Anyone can fork Docker and start monetizing it tomorrow in a completely different way than we had anticipated. This is actually a good thing. There's a separation of Docker between the project and the company, and there's a virtuous cycle of the company aligning to the objectives of the project and the project benefiting by all of the business-y things you can do. > Competitive Advantage We don't own the project, the community does. We fundamentally believe the value of a platform or ecosystem is proportional to the amount of competition it brings to everyone. As per above, we have no interest in locking in a competitive advantage on the Docker project that only we can benefit from. > Doing Open Source Right We have a long ways to go! We're certainly trying something new - but we've gathered a lot of momentum and our focus is just to continue working with the community, our great partners, and work diligently to deliver great product and support to our users.
- weavie 12y ago
  Great reply. I love the way you guys think, it makes me very happy that you guys are finding success.
- peterwwillis 12y ago
  That is one way of putting it. Another way is that you're creating a new de facto standard and making sure everyone needs to use it. The partnerships you make build your product into other products, making it the default option for anything someone might need to do with containers. Then you increase the visibility of the product (and thus the company) by getting lots of PR and making sure VCs and potential customers read it. But competition has nothing to do with open source. Source code is not a competitive advantage, even if you get minor quality improvements like increased code visibility and test coverage. No open source company has ever forked code from an existing product, started a competing business, and stolen business away from the originator. Companies that provide services on top of other people's code, however, often fall victim to a better sales pitch, customized tailored services or a shift in direction. And honestly, the idea that 'the community' owns the Docker project is a joke. Is the community getting 40 million dollars? Is the community making the design decisions for the product? Is the community pushing the integration of your tool with other companies and services? As far as I can see, you have a company based on a product, and you give that product away because it costs you nothing to do so. Open Source is a marketing tool, and a great one at that.

by weavie 12y ago

netcan 12y ago

Leaving aside some of the macro debating points on open source business models, I'm curious how often this kind of competition has ever become a problem for businesses. Docker aren't the first to create a business around open source software they develop. Has this ever killed a business before?

davidw 12y ago
> Has this ever killed a business before? I think there have been some companies that have died that way, yeah. It's tough to make money from open source, if obviously not impossible. Think how hard it is to get a regular old sell-something-for-money business off the ground, then throw in a way more complicated business model and relationships with community, customers and so on.... it's complicated!
nickstinemates 12y ago
I would look at something like MySQL vs. MariaDB vs. ... as soon as the main shepherd of the project has shown not to have the best interest of the community and ecosystem in mind, a prominent fork gets adopted. It definitely takes time.

why-el 12y ago

Docker are doing nothing new. There are few million to a billion dollar open source businesses out there (Red Hat is leading).

rtkwe 12y ago

The main way companies building or built around open source products make money is through services and expertise. Companies like Cloudera and RedHat are two prime examples, they're both built around open source projects but still make excellent money because of their service and support abilities.

weavie 12y ago
True. However, Linux and Hadoop are very complex beasts that really require and benefit from a lot of expertise when deployed in the enterprise. Perhaps I don't fully understand Docker, but really there isn't that much to it. Its a great product and massively useful, but does it really require that extensive knowledge to make the most of it? Docker is really just an extra layer over LXC..
- nickstinemates 12y ago
  > Docker is really just an extra layer over LXC This is not correct. The Docker engine has an ability to use LXC userland tools as an execution environment, but it is not the primary choice. libcontainer (github.com/docker/libcontainer) is. libcontainer has adoption outside of the Docker world (Parallels, CloudFoundry, as examples) which we find to be a fundamentally good thing. We can also spend time talking about the non-technical values of Docker, if you'd like to jump in to that.
  - weavie 12y ago
    Ah, thanks for putting me straight. Yes, please expound. I am largely just a lone developer looking to use docker for my fairly small projects. I currently just use Git for deployment. Is there any value to moving to Docker?
  - tinco 12y ago
    Would you say libcontainer is a reimplementation of LXC? Are they related in the sense that they use the same kernel features with the same goal of isolating processes?

nickstinemates 12y ago

I'll paraphrase the questions and provide answers best I can > How are Docker monetizing their product? We offer commercial support for Docker and also offer paid features on Docker Hub. > Competition? Docker is Apache 2 licensed. Anyone can fork Docker and start monetizing it tomorrow in a completely different way than we had anticipated. This is actually a good thing. There's a separation of Docker between the project and the company, and there's a virtuous cycle of the company aligning to the objectives of the project and the project benefiting by all of the business-y things you can do. > Competitive Advantage We don't own the project, the community does. We fundamentally believe the value of a platform or ecosystem is proportional to the amount of competition it brings to everyone. As per above, we have no interest in locking in a competitive advantage on the Docker project that only we can benefit from. > Doing Open Source Right We have a long ways to go! We're certainly trying something new - but we've gathered a lot of momentum and our focus is just to continue working with the community, our great partners, and work diligently to deliver great product and support to our users.

weavie 12y ago
Great reply. I love the way you guys think, it makes me very happy that you guys are finding success.
peterwwillis 12y ago
That is one way of putting it. Another way is that you're creating a new de facto standard and making sure everyone needs to use it. The partnerships you make build your product into other products, making it the default option for anything someone might need to do with containers. Then you increase the visibility of the product (and thus the company) by getting lots of PR and making sure VCs and potential customers read it. But competition has nothing to do with open source. Source code is not a competitive advantage, even if you get minor quality improvements like increased code visibility and test coverage. No open source company has ever forked code from an existing product, started a competing business, and stolen business away from the originator. Companies that provide services on top of other people's code, however, often fall victim to a better sales pitch, customized tailored services or a shift in direction. And honestly, the idea that 'the community' owns the Docker project is a joke. Is the community getting 40 million dollars? Is the community making the design decisions for the product? Is the community pushing the integration of your tool with other companies and services? As far as I can see, you have a company based on a product, and you give that product away because it costs you nothing to do so. Open Source is a marketing tool, and a great one at that.