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Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

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Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#51

Post by radlad »

phkahler wrote: post #45
leetharris wrote: post #3

Source available from the beginning is ethical. Open source that becomes something else is shady. I am glad they tried. I know there's lots of cynical stuff on the internet, but realistically the open source progress on stuff like Terraform or similar wouldn't have happened if these companies didn't try an alternative. I'm not sure what people want these companies to do. If there's no money, if the idea didn't work,…

>> Source available from the beginning is ethical. It's also mostly pointless. If someone wants to develop features for software they pay for I guess that's their choice. >> I'm not sure what people want these companies to do. Not rug-pull.

There are many reasons people prefer open source software other than wanting to do their own development: Security auditing, the ability to reverse engineer protocols / serialization formats, or simply to better understand a product's features.

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#52

Post by phkahler »

TheRealPomax wrote: post #36
TillE wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with making and selling proprietary software. If you want to make money, you should probably just do that. I'm very happy to have created a mildly popular permissively-licensed library. It's a contribution to a community with zero intention of profit. That is, for the most part, what open source is all about.

If you read me as saying making and selling proprietary software was wrong, you read a very different text from what I wrote. Making and selling software is perfectly fine, and building that software on top of libraries specifically released for that purpose is equally fine. Open source licenses that in perpetuity lock you out of any form of gains from your own work , even when that work is the very backbone of someo…

>> are morally objectionable licenses.

Easy on the drama there. Nobody makes someone use a particular piece of software. Don't build your product with pieces that don't fit your plans.

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#53

Post by godelski »

ergonaught wrote: post #22

Products aren't projects, which has confused people for decades. If open source products retreating from some of the "freedom" elements bothers you, then you should be focusing your ire on the megacorporations and overfunded startups who simply refuse to contribute to the financial viability of the products that sustain them. For some reason "we" celebrate the exploitative, though, so I guess that's out.

We saw this with xz. Many, including me, suggested this is an example of how paying developers could reduce likelihood of attack and speed up progress. These people make these products in their spare time. You know... After work. So they clearly would rather do that than their job. But a common response was "what, so we could pay the hacker?" Which missed the entire point.

I'm also reminded by a relatively recent episode of either PIMA or Freakanomics (I forget which) where Steve asks Bill Gates why charities don't pay as well as corporate gigs and Gate's response was "it's a charity".

We seem to forget that things take work. Just because someone does that work on their own time and without asking for compensation doesn't mean that they don't deserve it. It just means their more passionate.

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#54

Post by radlad »

davisr wrote: post #30
aborsy wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s guaranteed to happen. Even beyond that, how are developers going to earn a living with FOSS, at least with open licensing? We have seen maintainers burnt out. It takes work to write code.

I make substantial income by selling copies of my AGPLv3-licensed program for $12/ea.

You've piqued my interest. Can you share more? Do you have a blog post about your product and how you sell it?

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#55

Post by calibas »

1oooqooq wrote: post #15
Cheer2171 wrote: post #9

"Corporate Open Source" is many things. Look at how many companies are paying for membership on the Linux Foundation Board: Platinum costs $500k a year, gold is $100k a year, and silver is $5-20k based on size: https://www.linuxfoundation.org/about/members

Linux foundation was never about Linux or open source. quite the contrary. the foundation started as a way for companies to band Against gpl. and they won the day Linus have up and allowed tainted kernel be the default and every device distributor moved their proprietary code to modules and rejoiced. their focus then was on gpl3 fud because google et al have much more money than modem vendors.

The resistance to GPL isn't just companies, I think you'll find the average programmer prefers using libraries licensed under MIT when given the choice.

It seems like there's a kind of political ideology over what "open source" even means and how it should be practiced.There's a school of thought that says we should switch everything over to viral copyleft licenses. This will "protect" the code and ensure all derivative work is always open source.

Then there's others, like myself, who believe if you want something that's truly "free and open" it should come with as few conditions as possible.

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#57

Post by phicoh »

kevingadd wrote: post #4
leetharris wrote: post #3

Source available from the beginning is ethical. Open source that becomes something else is shady. I am glad they tried. I know there's lots of cynical stuff on the internet, but realistically the open source progress on stuff like Terraform or similar wouldn't have happened if these companies didn't try an alternative. I'm not sure what people want these companies to do. If there's no money, if the idea didn't work,…

If you do actual open source and your product is any good, somebody else is just going to repackage it and sell it, either as SAAS/IAAS or as a boxed product. So why not get there first? It's depressing. That's been my experience every time I gave code away, at least. Somebody else made money off it.

If you make software with a small team and you have about 2 dozen customers who pay for a support contract, then those contracts are actually surprisingly cheap.

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#58

Post by deathanatos »

> And they're not even a pointless AI company!

Are you sure? (/s), because IBM mentioned "AI" no less than 10 times in their announcement of the purchase:

> AI-driven application growth … IBM's deep focus and investment in […] AI … The global excitement surrounding generative AI … HashiCorp's capabilities and talent will create a comprehensive hybrid cloud platform designed for the AI era … generative AI deployment continues to grow … IBM's commitment to […] AI innovation … today's AI revolution … AI-driven complexity … IBM is a leading provider of global […] AI, … IBM's breakthrough innovations in AI

Thankfully the press managed to delete most of those, though there were some announcement that nonetheless took the bait.

Re: Jeff Geerling: Corporate Open Source Is Dead

#59

Post by jackthetab »

twojobsoneboss wrote: post #35
skywhopper wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because they’re failing doesn’t mean switching licenses will help. HashiCorp did not increase the popularity of Terraform Cloud by clamping down on the ability of other companies to host Terraform services. There were any number of things HashiCorp could have done to improve revenue generation from their products without changing the source license. When they realized they weren’t building the best SaaS version…

It’s a business. It will by default do the easiest and least riskiest thing to make as much money as possible.

> ~~It’s a business. It~~ will by default...

They're humans. They will by default...

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