Lessons from building and growing an open source SaaS

I&#x27;ve been using Plausible for <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nslookup.io" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nslookup.io</a> for about a month now. I can definitely recommend it over Google Analytics. Simpler, more intuitive and privacy first.<p>However, at some point I&#x27;d like to monetize this site. I know there&#x27;s <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ethicalads.io&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ethicalads.io&#x2F;</a>, but they&#x27;ve limited their target audience to developers. Are there any privacy focused ad networks?

I’m working on an open source search alternative to Algolia, called Typesense [1], with a hosted SaaS option [2]. So our business model is very similar to Plausible.<p>re: OSS licensing, we use GPL and have been very hesitant about using something like AGPL. I’ve personally seen developers not use projects only because they’re AGPL. Even GPL seems to scare some developers.<p>Question for HN: have you recently wanted to use an OSS project in your stack and then stayed away from using it only because of its license?<p>If so, what license was it and what about the license prevented you from using it?<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;typesense&#x2F;typesense" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;typesense&#x2F;typesense</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cloud.typesense.org" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cloud.typesense.org</a>

Question for OP Can you share how you manage the borders between the open source product and the infrastructure for offering a SaaS<p>As a trivial example, I’m assuming youre using plausible in plausible, do you have protections ensuring secrets don’t leak to the open source for history ?

I&#x27;ve been running Plausible for two of my sites on a Dokku instance for the last few months. I would highly recommend it to anyone who wants some simple metrics without invading people&#x27;s privacy.

I had never considered that a paying SaaS could be open source and that raises some questions to me, like: 1. Why would people pay instead of just downloading your code and running it for free? 2. Couldn&#x27;t anyone grab your code, tweak the UI to make it look different and then sell it as their own SaaS which would be your competitor taking some market share away from you with your own code?

I am impressed with your business but the open source development model is worrying. Why not release as normally as you would in your SaaS? It&#x27;s fine if this is the invisible &quot;hook&quot; where you get an unstable product if you self-host(and from the outside, it seems that&#x27;s what this is). also, fathom also has pretty much stopped all development :&#x2F;.

<i>&gt; There’s no longer any guarantee that, we as creators of Plausible, will be able to help out with your self-hosting issues [...] be prepared to troubleshoot your issues, read our documentation or get community support in the forum.</i><p>This is sane, and how most other open source applications or tools work. Don&#x27;t see any reason why this one should be different.

I’ll be interested to see how the plan for bi-annual releases for self-hosted analytics goes - in theory that will be better

I&#x27;ve been using Plausible for almost a month now and I love it. Previously, I have been using Simple Analytics, which is also great from a privacy perspective. But I personally just like Plausible more because it&#x27;s open source, self-hostable (although I currently don&#x27;t) and has better UX&#x2F;UI.

Love plausible analytics.<p>Upgraded to a paid plan for my project which is getting some traction and I was able to get exactly the kind of analytics I was looking for. I also share similar principles with regards to user privacy and so it’s definitely something I want people to use more and advocate for.<p>Great work folks.

interesting article. outside of gitlab, ghost.org are there other companies that embrace this model?

Open source is not the antidote to surveillance capitalism.<p>Something like this, however, is: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;anonymous.4open.science&#x2F;r&#x2F;e85a54a3-983d-498c-8672-0aa120fcfce2&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;anonymous.4open.science&#x2F;r&#x2F;e85a54a3-983d-498c-8672-0a...</a>

GNU argues that you should not use MIT or LGPLv3 for your library, because then the library will be used in proprietary software to oppress and tyrant people, possibly including yourself.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.gnu.org&#x2F;licenses&#x2F;why-not-lgpl.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.gnu.org&#x2F;licenses&#x2F;why-not-lgpl.html</a>