Docker Acquires Mutagen • Hacker News Board

Re: Docker Acquires Mutagen

#61

Post by windexh8er » Wed, Jun 28, 2023, 1:10 AM UTC

gyudin wrote: post #11

Kinda astonishing how some startup with almost no revenue that burned through hundreds millions of dollars is still able to acquire anything x)

The part that was doing no rev was Docker Enterprise. This was sold off to Mirantis [0]. This was a good thing for both Mirantis and Docker. The Mirantis brass knew the enterprise much better than the ignorant leadership that was running the ship prior to the acquisition. I happened to be there at the time. Folks like Steve Singh (former CEO), Roger Egan (SVP Sales) and Betty Junod (VP Product & Product Marketing) were all ignorant to what could have been a very successful run with Docker Enterprise. They were literally trying to hock everything customers already had and didn't want from Docker. What customers kept asking for was what Docker is doing today. While they've had a number of missteps the current leadership clearly understands their target market and... Listens. Steve, Roger and Betty? They always knew better and didn't listen to their own people. It was bizzaro-land where Betty's quest to define personas was the answer to all of Docker's woes. Looking back the entire thing felt like a season of Silicon Valley.

But yeah, if you think Docker doesn't have any runway these days you haven't followed much of them over the last few years.

[0] https://www.zdnet.com/article/mirantis-acquires-docker-enter...

Re: Docker Acquires Mutagen

#62

Post by sneak » Wed, Jun 28, 2023, 2:09 AM UTC

xenoscopic wrote: post #42

sneak wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You started an open source business making and publishing free software. How do you feel about going to work for a proprietary software vendor that ships lots of closed source software under restrictive licenses? Was it a change in your own views toward user freedom (and an abandonment of free software ideology) or a practical matter?

I'd point out that most of the foundational components of Docker's technology stack are FOSS (e.g. [0] [1]). Mutagen also has (and had, prior to acquisition) closed-source components and components licensed under non-OSI licenses (e.g. SSPL), so evaluate my response in that context (and also please note that these are my responses, and not representative of Docker's opinions/positions). Also, as mentioned in the acqu…

> Also, as mentioned in the acquisition FAQ [2], we don't have any plans to change the open-source licensing structure, and we're still open to contributions.

Well, assuming you require contributors to sign a CLA, that is requiring anyone who donates software to your organization to allow you to release it in nonfree products (something Docker requires today, given that they ship proprietary software).

I'm personally really tired of this sort of free software cosplay, where companies pretend to respect user freedoms but are actually just pretending to embrace free software ideology with a license here or there but don't actually support user freedoms (as evidenced by their continued use of nonfree licenses and CLAs to enable dual licensing).

> but so long as you're setting natural (non-contrived) boundaries between open-source and proprietary, then I don't think you're doing anything wrong

I do. You can't be said to respect user freedoms if you, you know, don't respect user freedoms on a regular basis by promoting proprietary software that users can't easily modify and redistribute freely. That's actively user-hostile, just like Docker Inc has been with Docker Desktop and other products.

Re: Docker Acquires Mutagen

#63

Post by kyriakos » Wed, Jun 28, 2023, 2:47 AM UTC

orra wrote: post #3

Anybody use this? Either the cloud service or the open source command line file sync app? I've dabbled with the latter, but not much besides that.

Use it for sync between dev instances and local. Works very well. It's one of those things that once you set it up gets out of your way and let's you do your work.