FTFA: "Moreover, by definition it implies that open source projects have many more mistakes, bad code and failed efforts on their way to succeeding, compared with conventional projects."<p>Wait, what? How, exactly, does OSS "by definition" have more mistakes?
I don't think open source is really about making money for most companies, it's more about improving quality and keeping costs down. At a former employer we did follow the give-it-away-and-charge-for-a-service model, but we also worked on several of the open source libraries and frameworks we built our products on.<p>We shared all of this work with the upstream projects, as we had no interest whatsoever in maintaining private forks and because better quality infrastructure attracts more users, which again leads to further improvements or at least ensures the project stays maintained.
Building a viable business on top of an open source project is totally possible. But, like building lots of other types of businesses, it can be difficult.<p>These challenges cut close to some things we are aiming to solve at Assembly [<a href="http://assembly.com" rel="nofollow">http://assembly.com</a>]. One such question we hope to answer is this: "how can people build a real, profitable company in a collaborative, open manner like they build in an open source environment?"<p>An example is Coderwall, which makes more than $25,000/month [1] and is built and maintained by the community. Each month, revenue goes to the people who are building the product. All the code is publicly available [2], and licensed to be used non-commercially. A core team of contributors guide vision and quality control, but anyone can participate.<p>It's not exactly open source, but products on Assembly are built in the open and anyone can dive in and help out. Some products have lofty ambitions to make big revenue, and others are are more aimed at being a public offering like a traditional open source project.<p>[1] <a href="https://assembly.com/coderwall/posts/coderwall-coinholder-update" rel="nofollow">https://assembly.com/coderwall/posts/coderwall-coinholder-up...</a>
[2] <a href="https://github.com/assemblymade/coderwall" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/assemblymade/coderwall</a>
"An entire economy where you gave a little [software] to get a lot [of software] ... it’s time to admit that this idea didn’t work out"<p>If this article was published in 1998, and we revisited it in 2008, we would have concluded that the author was proven wrong by a landslide.<p>The idea that someone still thinks this in 2014, and is confident enough in his opinion to publish it, is ridiculous.
I work on open source software with two other developers and our business makes enough to pay for three full-time salaries (they're low-end software developer salaries, but we all live comfortably in the USA and Mexico).<p>We sell two WordPress plugins, both of which have free counterparts (think Lite/Pro). The source code is GPL for both versions.<p>Why do people buy the Pro version of our software? That's we've asked many times over the past few years. I feel they buy the Pro version for both the features and, more importantly, for the fact that it will be _updated_ and _maintained_, and they will have _access to support_. Site owners that want to use one of our plugins recognize that by paying for the plugin they get access to support and features not available in the Lite version, whereas the free version has limited features and only community support.<p>Could someone copy the source code for the Pro version and sell it? Sure. (And people have.) But can they copy our Pro support and sell that? Not so much. Can they copy our reputation? Nope.<p>I've learned over the past few years just how valuable "access to support" is for many people. Even if they never contact us, just knowing that we're there _in case something goes wrong_ is comforting enough for them to pay for that comfort.<p>If more open source projects started offering support, I bet you'd have a lot more open source developers making money.<p>For example, if I decided to set up `mutt` for the first time to switch over from web-based email, would I buy a "mutt support service" from someone that allowed me to submit `mutt` questions through a ticketing system while I was setting up and getting familiar with `mutt`? Yes! I would, especially if that person had a reputation in the community as someone who knows `mutt` inside out.<p>It's also worth noting how offering support helps drive documentation. If the documentation is great then a developer can easily point people to the relevant information and save him/herself time (so that support doesn't take up all available time). I basically used this type of "ask me a question, I'll create documentation for it and then reply with a link" method with my Independent Publisher WordPress theme project [1].<p>[1]: <a href="http://github.com/raamdev/independent-publisher" rel="nofollow">http://github.com/raamdev/independent-publisher</a>
Its extremely difficult to make money with open source. With the notable exception of Red Hat there aren't a lot of open source companies that are known to be consistently profitable.<p>Most of the bigger companies raised money when VC's believed in the open source business model and are still operating on those funds. That's an avenue that is no longer open to today's open source entrepreneurs.<p>One possible exception might be the WordPress model of offering hosting.
The economic system in the US in based on very, very strong property rights. This greatly skews the advantage from the ones doing the work to the ones who own the result of this work.<p>If US property rights were not so strong there would not be such enormous advantages given to those who produce proprietary software. This isn't as much an issue with open source business models as much as it is with US economic policy.
I don't find open source as a product has the benefits we assume it must.<p>Theoretically, yes, if I have the source every change and customization I want to make is just a recompile away.<p>Practically speaking that almost never happens because now I'm likely forking a huge code base and almost always abandoning the support contract I paid money for to do so.<p>Unfortunately, because theoretically speaking anyone can change anything, authors seem to neglect the whole documentation and API portion of open-source software, and that's what I typically want in practice.<p>Obviously there are exceptions, but most people pay money for support, warranties, integration with existing systems, documentation and available training. All of those things have very little to do with whether the source code is open or not.
It's a shame our options have been reduced to a false dichotomy of pay-for software where you have no access to the source, and pay-nothing-for software where all you have is the source. There was supposed to be another option for pay-for software where you have access to the source and may make changes to that source to suite your needs: "free" was supposed to refer to "freedom" and not "cost." But no one seems to have gone that route. Is it just not viable?
Dual licensing, like Trolltech did originally with QT, could also be a viable commercial strategy for certain open source projects, but that seems to be going out of fashion lately.
What about the software maintainers that are often salaried employees?<p>And what about the main users of the software that are saving money by using free software?<p>But of course your whole competitive edge is that you are giving away those rights to keep the software proprietary and to dictate who can use it, for what and for how much. You cannot simply expect to put a price tag on it and sell it, "as is".
> The open source method may be effective if enough people play along, but it does not make money in itself. Moreover, <i>by definition it implies that open source projects have many more mistakes, bad code and failed efforts</i> on their way to succeeding, compared with conventional projects.<p>Which definition of open source (method?) do they go by?
<i>Remember how the open source software movement was supposed to be like Woodstock, with everybody sharing and everything free?</i><p>No?<p>I'll go back and finish the article, but it's starting to look like the something you'd see in a tweet from @nytonit "Building a business around a product you give away is hard and The Times is ON IT."
> A regular company couldn’t have experimented with creating 10 versions of an online photo album, then picked the best one.<p>Yes, but often 10 companies try to make an online photo album and the market picks one (or a few). The comparison between open source projects and the dynamics inside a company doesn't seem like the right one.
Linus Torvalds knew that "the GPL would turn <i>as many</i> people away as it would attract" and exactly of that (it attracted a lot) he considers his decision <i>for the GPL</i> "to be the <i>best</i> decision he ever made" (though he disagrees with the too strong ideological believes of RMS "I want to (be able to) reprogram my printer's software"... sorry what?!). Linus used the big wave (pro & cons discussion on the GPL) for getting his Linux off the ground (which he succeeded with). And he is so incredibly smart and doing things right (showed it again with git... slamming CVS&SVN basically to death in a talk he gave).<p>Google, Facebook and others are open sourcing a good amount admitting, that this attracts skilled people (probably to be hired) and benefits their code (in the open)... "companies that use your code are never competitors". Though they remain the major force behind these projects, e.g. being accused to be show offs (hiphop vm) "look how great we are, but you'll never get it to work".<p>The default license on git hub is MIT. Sorry GPL, but forcing everyone to open source on modifications they make. NO way <i>for me</i>: Take it (<a href="http://www.use-the-tree.com" rel="nofollow">http://www.use-the-tree.com</a>) and make it proprietary (and better and make a business), you are so welcome. When you succeed with that, then congrats to you.<p>Enterprises <i>want to pay</i> and they go for FUD "no accountant was ever fired for buying IBM/Microsoft/HP". It's hard to break into that and they are even right with it, because when buying from a large vendor they are also buying into the huge support/manpower.<p>How does Ubuntu want to generate income? Selling shirts and Coffee-cups with "Ubuntu" printed on (okay advertising for Amazon in Unity) and diverging from "Linux for people/the desktop" to Ubuntu-Server/Cloud? But the fact that they sell T-Shirts and coffee cups (and others sell likewise silly things, like boxes with CDs and printed manuals), wow... that's a confession of failure (for <i>this type</i> of doing open source).<p>So "open source (almost) everything" (2011) [1], what a late(!) and great contribution to this discussion (free from ideological believes and focused on business).<p>Does RMS still live for free on the Harvard/MIT campus? And sorry I was in the group that was turned away back in the times.<p>[1] <a href="http://tom.preston-werner.com/2011/11/22/open-source-everything.html" rel="nofollow">http://tom.preston-werner.com/2011/11/22/open-source-everyth...</a>