Comment by open-source-ux | Hacker News Reader

Comment by open-source-ux | Hacker News Reader

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Among the thousands of open source projects, the ones championed as successful open source business make up a tiny proportion i.e. the exception not the norm.

Meanwhile the SaaS business model continues to eat the software market. A model that gives users less control than the desktop software model. And where the source code (built on open source) is not visible.

Open source software has been critical to the success of the SaaS model. You could argue SaaS is the true success of the 'open source business model'. Just not in the way open source advocates expected it to be.

There is another option - one that some open source advocates will immediately dislike: source-only products i.e. you sell your software product to customers to run them themselves. You give them the source code of your product so they can customise it to meet their needs. But the software is not open source and cannot be shared the way open source can.

There are successful source-only products. Two examples: Craft CMS and Kirby CMS. Both publish their source code on GitHub [1] [2] and rely on the honesty of their customers to pay (which they do). They have a thriving community of developers making plugins and extensions - proving that you can create a community of developers around a 'source-only' product.

[1] Craft CMS: https://github.com/craftcms

[2] Kirby: https://github.com/getkirby

> Among the thousands of open source projects, the ones championed as successful open source business make up a tiny proportion i.e. the exception not the norm.

I think this is a correlation not a causation thing. Specifically, open source is a great place to put hobby or WIP projects - SaaS isn't, you wouldn't want to pay for others to use your stuff for free. Certainly, historically, your point is valid - SaaS has benefitted hugely thus far, but I think it seems rational this starts to change.

Open core feels like it has the advantage of the source-only approach yet also enables a community to use a free product on top, generating faster growth and user trust and feedback, all of which are harder to create with SAAS. The downside? You have to build two products. At least for those willing to do the VC route (not for everyone), it is possible to get funding to do this.

Disclaimer: I am a co-founder of a VC-backed open core company!

Same can be done shareware.

> Among the thousands of open source projects, the ones championed as successful open source business make up a tiny proportion i.e. the exception not the norm.

I think that open source projects tend to be smaller. However, is size the correct proxy for success? I would argue it isn't for companies, and rather the opposite in fact.

A small company that does well what it set out to do is successful in my view, even if you can count the employees on one hand. Likewise for software projects. Also, maintenance mode is a thing, and it's all right, so the number of commits isn't a good proxy either, IMO.

> And where the source code (built on open source) is not visible.

Is the software for your SaaS required to be open sourced?

Sure, you may be building your business off of Linux or other open source software code, but you’re not modifying it.

And if you need to modify it, then maybe you can share it back with the community.

But, I would think that the product you built, should be your own intellectual property.

The Polyform Project has a set of standardized source-available licenses. These can be used for a dual-licensing business model. Customers can use the software for free under the terms of the source-available license, or pay to buy a proprietary license.

https://polyformproject.org/

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