And that's a large part of the problem. We, as an Enterprise, don't want something with rapid evolving infrastructure, features. We need stability, critical and security patches. Emphasis on stability. 3 years is a minimum we would consider for that and not a 1 year only support range.
That's exactly why you do not need/want docker now. Several years ago Hypervisors like XEN were all the rage. Enterprise could not rely on it, because of the lack of LTS, while smaller startups and businesses were building their infrastructure around it. Everyone is now using those technologies which have undergone years of testing and have massive support from vendors. Docker will reach that stage in the future, but right now it's just too soon. You are asking the Docker team to slow down the development of the technology for everyone because you don't want to deal with the consequences of using a developing product. Let docker reach it's full potential, let the community do the testing, then ask for LTS on a mature technology. At that point, there will be probably be a new trend somewhere that will bring startups to the next level while your get to benefit from containerisation with full vendor support.
Then the AWS/Google/DO/other worked hard on the hypervisor and they released infra that worked and is entreprisey ready... but it's a complete offering, you cannot just get their Xen package and put it on your systems (assuming it's even powered by Xen anymore), you have to use their platforms.
Docker is unstable now.
AWS/Google/RedHat/CoreOS are all working pretty hard to pull out an offering for containers that works and is entreprisey ready. It's gonna take years to be production ready enough for critical systems, and it's as likely to reuse Docker as to replace it with their own more stable tech.
The point is, docker is nowhere near ready in its current state. Wait and see.
The commercial distributions (by Pivotal, IBM, SAP most notably) are licensed to gigabuck corporations worldwide.
That said, other companies and opensource projects will absolutely move towards the value line. There's no money or glory in building blocks.
Disclosure: I work for Pivotal, the major contributor of engineering to Cloud Foundry.
EDIT: I did not realize it was per node pricing. I take back mostly everything I said below. I hope that ultimately when Docker does provide 3 years of support, you'll be willing to pay up.
Look at the pricing, even the biggest Enterprise plan is $2000/yr. This is aimed at small consultancies, startups and small businesses, etc that are tired of sending their developers into the docker github issues to log bugs and argue features.
When Docker adds a plan that satisfies your Enterprise, you'll be paying typical Enterprise prices that will be at least an order of magnitude larger than the current biggest plan. Hopefully you are able to put your money where your mouth is.
- https://www.docker.com/customers/docker-datacenter-delivers-...
- https://www.docker.com/customers/ge-uses-docker-enable-self-...
- https://www.docker.com/customers/ing-delivers-value-customer...
There are many more here: https://www.docker.com/customers
Also, as others have noted: the price point is per-node. Docker EE is most definitely for enterprises.
Disclosure: I work for Pivotal, etc.