Sustainability of open-source projects

SoftwareFreedom Chat
#1

Hi,

We have many tech-based startups emerging in myriad domains in recent times, though very few makes their source-code / process open. This makes me wonder if there are other systemic models to encourage open-source design of projects beyond support by patrons.

  • How does one go about pitching a new tech startup to make their design/ technology open? Does obscure tech really give one competitive advantage?

  • How does the development of free and open source projects generally supported?

  • Do we have examples of institutional model to support and encourage free and open source projects?

Thanks!

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#2

There’s examples of tech startups (and giants) open-sourcing their existing code to attract talent and at a bigger stage, demand skills from prospective employees. What better way to actually learn from the giants that do well in the feild? I mean say Facebook’s multiple open projects (including OpenAI) or say Spotify’s Annoy or something like Tesla’s open patents…

If we look at it, companies like Google have made Android or Colab open because they want people to use and embrace it before ofcourse it becomes too mainstream and once it does, introduction of ‘premium slabs’ become business models. This works both ways, it’s sustainable for the open software at hand, and the company at a later stage. So, following the ‘free’ frenzy if any tech startup can benefit from it then it certainly should.

Moreover, to build their ‘portfolios’ software engineers would prefer highlighting their code in public :sweat_smile: by default which actually affects tech companies which provide services to businesses instead of consumer service.

I think obscure tech can be of advantage in cases where you are building something entirely new (borrowing the theme of a patent) or where you cannot afford for parts of a software to be accessible by any means. (for example SEGA company used obscure codes and actually over-engineered even the CDs with different markings to protect and license their games to only their consoles and it remained uncracked for more than 20 years)

There’s news daily like this : https://analyticsindiamag.com/5-open-source-startups-that-are-making-it-big-in-2020/

@ShrirajHegde thoughts?

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#3

@gauravagarwal Definitely huge corporates like Facebook, Google, and Microsoft are recognizing the advantages of opensource software for their profit. Especially these companies are making use of the MIT license for open source projects which they release closed sourced binaries with their branding like Chrome or VS Code

Does obscure tech really give one competitive advantage?

@ravi312
Sometimes yes, but actually not compulsorily, companies like Github use Git a FOSS software for their whole business model, companies can use an open code base and create a service out of it and pioneer it to create a sustainable business.

For example, RHEL was acquired by IBM, where CentOS (at the time) existed as a completely free alternative, but still, RHEL made revenue from corporate customers in providing service and management of an open-source OS which made them worth 34 billion USD :exploding_head: .

So no, with a well thought-out business model, even a completely open-source project can be made profitable.

@gauravagarwal ?