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Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

blog.timescale.com

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Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#41

Post by wizzwizz4 »

robenkleene wrote: post #35
nine_k wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are extremely niche in a sense. There are very few other search engines (all much smaller), and there's no another Facebook. The market just naturally gravitates to the biggest player.

What's the definition of niche being used here? I'd define it as software that's only relevant to a small percentage of the population (i.e., that obviously wouldn't include Facebook and Google).

It does include Facebook and Google, because Facebook and Google do not make up a large proportion of the population.

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#42

Post by buzzkillington »

whatsmyusername wrote: post #30
ossworkerrights wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open source is enabling large corporations to establish monopolies. Open source powers google and amazon yet the authors get little return from it. Open source has killed indie development.

And we all get a better product because of it, moving the ship of humanity a little bit further along.

A better gas chamber is not something to be proud of.

And facebook has already been used for genocide: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-facebo...

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#43

Post by amelius »

whatsmyusername wrote: post #32
amelius wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course, if your business is selling operating systems, development tools, databases and other infrastructure stuff, then, yup, open source has eaten your business. It seems like the rule is that open source is eating all-except-niche software.

It forces you to make products instead of tools. Putting tools behind a paywall is wack.

Most software can be classified as a tool, except e.g. games.

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#45

Post by fierarul »

akulkarni wrote: post #26
fierarul wrote: post #14

This is a decent article that could stand on its own. It is also a PR piece by TimescaleDB which has all interest in convincing people/investors that an open-source company is a good deal: > (Disclaimer: Our company TimescaleDB is an open-source time-series database startup and shares investors with several of these companies, including Elastic, MongoDB, Hortonworks, Confluent, and Databricks.) There were more paragr…

This comment is really funny. The way we (TimescaleDB) try to convince people (and investors) is with our product, not blog posts. But we write blog posts to transparently share our learnings with the rest of the world. That's just the open-source way. :-) Btw for others who are reading - contributing to open-source is still very much a way to build your career, travel the world, etc. I personally know people who are…

It's not funny if you think that http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html is more or less mandatory reading on HN.

I would like to see some data point towards the success related to open source involvement. I'm sure outliers exist just as there are people doing really well with their solo AppStore app or with their niche website.

And I'm saying this as somebody involved in open source: better to see it as a hobby done out of passion. Any other benefits are random/luck and except if you get to feel some passion for a highly sought out niche (hello Machine Learning) you shouldn't expect anything out of it. Entering into it with the expectation of building your career, traveling the world, etc is going to lead to disappointment.

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#46

Post by whelsemin »

robenkleene wrote: post #35
nine_k wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are extremely niche in a sense. There are very few other search engines (all much smaller), and there's no another Facebook. The market just naturally gravitates to the biggest player.

What's the definition of niche being used here? I'd define it as software that's only relevant to a small percentage of the population (i.e., that obviously wouldn't include Facebook and Google).

"extremely focused?"

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#47

Post by [deleted] »

kazinator wrote: post #10

Open source isn't eating all proprietary software. Open source is enabling proprietary software to be more profitable, because it makes free all the commodity pieces that are needed to make proprietary software work. Customers would otherwise have to pay for these things (in an ongoing manner) leaving less of their $$$ to spend on your payload. Open source powers SaaS which is so closed and proprietary that the user…

[deleted]

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#48

Post by tluyben2 »

ossworkerrights wrote: post #29
kazinator wrote: post #10

Open source isn't eating all proprietary software. Open source is enabling proprietary software to be more profitable, because it makes free all the commodity pieces that are needed to make proprietary software work. Customers would otherwise have to pay for these things (in an ongoing manner) leaving less of their $$$ to spend on your payload. Open source powers SaaS which is so closed and proprietary that the user…

Open source is enabling large corporations to establish monopolies. Open source powers google and amazon yet the authors get little return from it. Open source has killed indie development.

> Open source is enabling large corporations to establish monopolies. > Open source powers google and amazon yet the authors get little return from it.

A different license could fix that but that goes against the philosophy; it would fix it though. People are trying that and a lot of other people are dead against it for good reasons, but how else can it be fixed?

Even if you don't make it viral towards revenue, then GPL works the best imho; at least the big corps must give back when they make changes. The problem is that many use non viral licenses and then it's just free for all. I personally do that as well at times, but it does what you say.

> Open source has killed indie development.

In what way? I don't understand the remark.

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#49

Post by ClumsyPilot »

amelius wrote: post #43
whatsmyusername wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It forces you to make products instead of tools. Putting tools behind a paywall is wack.

Most software can be classified as a tool, except e.g. games.

I think he means tools for making software not business tools

Re: Open-source and the demise of proprietary software (2018)

#50

Post by ClumsyPilot »

whatsmyusername wrote: post #30
ossworkerrights wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open source is enabling large corporations to establish monopolies. Open source powers google and amazon yet the authors get little return from it. Open source has killed indie development.

And we all get a better product because of it, moving the ship of humanity a little bit further along.

I don't think that getting stronger amazon market position "moves the ship of humanity further along", it's probably regressive if anything.
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