Is Commercialization Killing Open Source?

An anonymous reader writes "IBM, Sun, Novell, and Red Hat all have a very significant open source element to their businesses. In addition to these juggernauts, there is growing investment in various open source models. Will money flowing into open source destroy its roots? Mark Hinkle just posted an editorial asking the questions Is Commercialization Killing Open Source? in which he comments on 'opensville' and gives some actual investment data, and a lot of insight into the growing trend in 'open source commercialization'. Is there such a thing as 'too much money' when it comes to developing software?"

Just ask Clippy or Madden 200X

[CrazyJim1]

Is there such a thing as 'too much money' when it comes to developing software?"

Just like the movie industry, you're pushed to release sequels as frequently as possible even when you really don't have anything new or innovative to release.

Re:Just ask Clippy or Madden 200X

[buswolley]

Yeah and these open-source roots are like movie extras; They all must die in the end.

Re:Just ask Clippy or Madden 200X

[cshotton]

Is there such a thing as 'too much money' when it comes to developing software?"

The issue isn't about whether too much money or commercialization is killing open source software (culture/roots/projects). It seems to me that the root cause has to do with the nature of the widely publicized open source projects. As open operating systems (Linux, NetBSD, etc.) and applications (Mozilla/Firefox, OpenOffice, etc.) grow in complexity, they outstrip the abilities of ad hoc, grass roots "open source" organizations to develop and maintain them.

Simply put any serious, valuable, widely-used open source project today is very likely a large and complicated one. Open Source has outgrown its own infrastructure and the only one available that can pick up the projects and move them forward are those operated by commercial organizations with the resources to throw at these hard problems.

Re:Just ask Clippy or Madden 200X

[Arker]

I think you have it exactly backwards.

As projects become larger and more complex, they outstrip the ability of anything but a decentralised network of programmers. The resources of a traditional centralised software company, even the biggest in the business, is nothing compared to what decentralised networks of programmers have. The linux kernel team being one excellent example. And commercial software houses - *many* of them - are definitely involved, but the model is still distributed. No single company could handle that task - a widely distributed team from all around the world, with both commercial and noncommercial interests contributing, can and does.

Projects that attempt to decentralise their development while still retaining a monolithic structure internally may find that doesnt work so well, of course. For this to work the project must follow the 'unix way' and have many more-or-less self contained modules that work together, rather than building monolithic do-everthing apps. Not everyone seems to grok that yet, but give it time.

Re:Just ask Clippy or Madden 200X

[jacksonj04]

It's a good point, however there *must* be something specifying how those modules should behave when errors occur, handle input etc or the whole thing reaches the stage Linux has now where it works, and works well for the vast majority of tasks, but only if you remember the right combination of switches to make one module talk nicely to another module provided that you pipe it through a shell script to do something trivial like remove blank lines, because the first app includes them for readability but the developers of the second app decided that they should correspond to an EOF.

The 'unix way' is great, don't get me wrong, but it's now reached the stage where there should be a central body saying "Here are various behaviours, you should use these switches to achieve them. Here is how you should format your output. If this happens, throw this specific error." and so on. People, especially businesses, don't like to have to learn the nuances of every individual app because the developers use -E and not -e.

Re:Just ask Clippy or Madden 200X

[samkass]

Ironically, the commercial and military software development industries have recently been heavily promoting a methodology that could enable this sort of specification without requiring a central authority. Software Product Lines [cmu.edu] is a formalization of hundreds of "good practices" of encapsulation and interoperability into a single methodology that is transforming the way some software is written. I see this as the next step in software development evolution, and one that the open source community might get more benefit from than others.

Re:

[Arker]

It's a good point, however there *must* be something specifying how those modules should behave when errors occur, handle input etc or the whole thing reaches the stage Linux has now where it works, and works well for the vast majority of tasks, but only if you remember the right combination of switches to make one module talk nicely to another module provided that you pipe it through a shell script to do something trivial like remove blank lines, because the first app includes them for readability but the

Re:

[owlstead]

"For this to work the project must follow the 'unix way' and have many more-or-less self contained modules that work together, rather than building monolithic do-everthing apps. Not everyone seems to grok that yet, but give it time."

You are completely right on that. Just have a look at the Eclipse framework (yes, I'm a Java user), and you'll see this executed in a very clear way. It's a complete set of modules. Even the base install contains many tens of modules. The number of plugins available for Eclipse

Re:

[cshotton]

I think you have it exactly backwards. As projects become larger and more complex, they outstrip the ability of anything but a decentralised network of programmers.

There are many, many types of systems that do not lend themselves to the "million monkeys" approach to systems engineering. Grafting one-off utility programs or plug-ins or other modular elements onto a large, central framework (be it an O/S, and IDE, a web browser, graphics tool or any other modular app) is not anything like the design and en

Re:

[The_Wilschon]

According to wikipedia, the Linux kernel 2.6.0 had just a hair under 6 million lines of code. The linux kernel has always been developed by a decentralized network of programmers, a herd of cats, as you so aptly put it. That is, the initial framework, if there is such a thing, was also created by a decentralized network.

Solaris, OTOH, has always been developed as a centralized project. Not many people would say that Solaris is really superior to Linux at this point. Perhaps it was simply not well run?

Re:

[Arker]

Solaris is a very good kernel. But compare the time in development with that of Linux. Sun saw the writing on the wall and realised they simply couldn't keep up with the 'herd of cats' in the long run - hence the release of Solaris as Free Software.

Re:

[SL Baur]

What has open source accomplished that Microsoft didn't accomplish 10 years in advance?

I'll name one - deliver a system that can stay up and functional for years at a time. This crappy enterprise Microsoft Windows XP "Professional" I'm typing on can't seem to stay alive more than a few days at a time. Bah. Rebooot this year or next year, it shouldn't matter. Rebooting every few days is unprofessional. The first time I got +1 year uptime on a Linux system in production use was with Linux kernel 2.0.6. Date that and remember that over that time period that system also survived the great

MS the creator of all things good?

[el americano]

What has open source accomplished that Microsoft didn't accomplish 10 years in advance?

Pretty much everything. Those open source projects that didn't pre-date the MS versions were easily coded afterwards in somewhat less than 10 years. It's not as if MS was the original innovator anyway. Did Internet Explorer come out 10 years before Netscape? Is MS not copying ideas for their browser from Firefox now? Come on! They wrote their spreadsheet after Lotus123. Their word processor after Word Perfect. Where is th

Re:

[pipingguy]

Is that sort of like feeling the need to reply to a Slashdot post when you have nothing relevant or informative to say about the parent or subject matter? Oh, wait...

As a GNOME fan

[Andrew Tanenbaum]

I'm happy about all the money coming into open source. If it wasn't for Red Hat's persistent support, GNOME would have died due to its awkward choice of technologies - and without that competitive pressure, Qt would probably have stayed closed-source, so KDE would have been dead in my book too. Big money in open source is win-win.

Re:

[buswolley]

I agree. We should all wish that open-source roots wither away. The idea lives on, but now with capitalistic efficiency. Maybe, just maybe, I'll now someday get grandma to use a free OS.

Re:

[Antique Geekmeister]

That's like wishing that all artists worked for ad companies. It's fine for them to get paid for work, but some of the best tools will continue to come from people's love of making things better or individual's frustration with a problem no one has seen fit to spend money on yet.

And "free" is not the same as "open source". Your grandma paying a few bucks with her computer to help set it up or answer her support calls is the service you're supposed to get when you buy a computer and get software with it. In

As a developer and a fan...

[EmbeddedJanitor]

Money is good.

Without money flowing in to OSS, fewer people will be able to do useful work.

Sure there is a perception of OSS being written by the selfless hackers giving all their spare time. In reality though, people need to eat, pay the rent and buy computers etc. When organisations fund OSS development they help make it real. OSS businesses have found various ways to make money and do so in various ways.

Re:As a developer and a fan...

[garett_spencley]

I agree as well. The last time I did any "real" OSS development was when I was a teenager. I wrote really crummy code back then and didn't make very many useful contributions. But I had a ton of ambition and a "do-good" attitude.

Now that I'm an adult and have a family to support I really wish I could get back into the game. I know I could really make a useful contribution. I'm am much more experienced, have vastly more knowledge and am thus in a much better position to contribute.

I just don't have the time anymore. Now I'm profit driven. My kids need to eat. The only way I see myself doing open source work is if I get paid for it. I wish I had more time to devote to hobbies but I spend 100% of my professional life sitting at a computer and so my hobby time is reserved for non-computer tasks.

So if companies can take people that are in my position and enable them to contribute to the community then that can only be a good thing.

It happens organically

[Anonymous Coward]

One day you'll need to fix something or write a replacement for some piece of software out of sheer annoyance and you'll release the code because that's the sensible thing to do.

That's our worth, freedom will always be more than a career path ;^)

Re:

[Antique Geekmeister]

I release it because it's written into the GPL, and because I make sure to distribute my software to my friends (if personally written) and my corporate partners (if it's work software). And I try to get as much as possible switched over to GPL to allow my partners and clients to get other support if I'm too busy. And I'm very busy: the pay is good when you can replace half a dozen "high-availability" and hideoously expensive servers with a few discarded hardware platforms running much more robust, document

Re:As a developer and a fan...

[mackyrae]

my hobby time is reserved for non-computer tasks.

Hobbies without computes? Those exist?

Re:As a developer and a fan...

[kestasjk]

Money is good.

Without money flowing in to OSS, fewer people will be able to do useful work.

Sure there is a perception of OSS being written by the selfless hackers giving all their spare time. In reality though, people need to eat, pay the rent and buy computers etc. When organisations fund OSS development they help make it real. OSS businesses have found various ways to make money and do so in various ways.

I think there's a distinction that has to be drawn. There are companies that hire programmers to work on Open Source projects, and return that source to the project. They'll do this to get their own features and be compelled by the license or otherwise to give the source back into the project. I think this is a positive thing, because it gets better as more companies use it.

With things like Red Hat where they are making money out of the source it's not so clearly beneficial, because conflicts of interest arise. If Red Hat can get more money for support by making things more complex or more likely to break they will; they're no longer necessarily in it to improve things, but to make money. When the two objectives are the same things improve, and have improved, but when they're not you get things like security patches being sold.

Re:As a developer and a fan...

[zsau]

I doubt there's a true conflict here. It's in Red Hat's best interest to minimise the amount of time they spend doing support. They went as much profit from their support as possible, and every time they have to do something, it eats into their profits. Red Hat would do much better using other funds convince everyone we need their support.

Re:

[init100]

If Red Hat can get more money for support by making things more complex or more likely to break they will

That would make sense if they charged per incident or per hour, but not with a yearly subscription fee. The more time they spend actually doing support, the less money do they make. In addition, support includes much more than a helpdesk line. It can include customization, integration, etc, not to mention the effort in staying binary compatible throughout the lifetime of a product.

I completely agree

[eklitzke]

I agree with this 100%. If you look at the work that goes into Gnome, a very large proportion of it comes from developers at Redhat and Novell. A lot of the developers are still unaffiliated with any large corporations, but certainly if you browse through the Gnome bugzilla you will see that a lot of the core developers that are pushing Gnome forward are paid for their work. And this really helps the community. Furthermore, Gnome has lately benefited from the interest of late from mobile and embedded developers, who have done a lot of work in push down the resource usage of Gnome components.

Gnome is a big project. There is a lot of code, and a lot of it is showing its age. If Gnome was an all volunteer effort, there would be a lot more focus on exciting new technologies, and less focus on fixing bugs and cleaning up old code. In a sense, this is how I see KDE. KDE is pushed forward by developing new projects and applications, but to a certain degree suffers from the fact that things are constantly being reinvented rather than refined. The hard work that has gone into Gnome by commercialization has helped reduced bugs in the code, kept it up to date, and continues to push the project forward.

Re:I completely agree

[Kjella]

KDE is pushed forward by developing new projects and applications, but to a certain degree suffers from the fact that things are constantly being reinvented rather than refined.

Well, I'm not that familiar with the KDE toolkit beyond being a KDE user, but I'd say the Qt toolkit is certainly being highly refined by Trolltech. With the release of Qt4, pretty much the whole KDE project has gone into a big upgrade cycle, with KDE4 out in late October. So while it might seem KDE progress has been slow in the last year or two, I think it will raise the bar when it arrives.

Re:

[conteXXt]

re: kde/qt next gen, all true but I think GP was making a slightly different point.

As I read it, she/he was referring to the fact that GNOME is less upgrade driven and more bug-fix/stability/footprint driven due to different target devices/users.

I may be wrong, but what do I know, I use kde or windowmaker :-)

Re:

[Kjella]

As I read it, she/he was referring to the fact that GNOME is less upgrade driven and more bug-fix/stability/footprint driven due to different target devices/users.

But is that a good thing? Take OpenBSD vs Linux, it doesn't take much to see which is more popular. Certainly if it gets to the point where it's so unstable to the point of being unusable, things are different but I don't think people really care that much. Explorer.exe crashes from time to time too, then it restarts itself and it's still fairly p

Re:

[smittyoneeach]

Three flavors of license, and their target:
Closed...wallet (money)
GPL......heart (community)
BSD......mind (technical excellence)
The IT ecology is has an operating point in some abstract venn diagram with lots of overlap between the three.
Let the good times roll, and leave the religion in your community of faith.

Re:

[smittyoneeach]

I agree that the use of quotation marks in the first place may have been more appropriate.
People overlook a logical, dispassionate, tolerant mindset when considering licensing, and their subjective affirmations on questions like 'property' and 'ethics' get in the way of a pragmatic consideration of reality.

Probably.

[m0rph3us0]

Just like investment of capital ruined the roots of the automotive industry. However, cars are much cheaper now than they would have been being produced one by one in a garage. The roots of any industry or technique usually suck compared to results after the industry has been fully capitalized. So, yes it will probably ruin the roots, but its a good thing.

Re:

[nacturation]

We need some kind of Godwin's Law [wikipedia.org] for car analogies...

How about a law for the first person to make a useless Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] link?
 

Re:

[owlnation]

How about a law for the first person to make a useless Wikipedia link?

There's such a thing as a useful wikipedia link?

Re:Probably.

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

There's such a thing as a useful wikipedia link?

Sure there is [wikipedia.org], though as I write this, its utility is questionable...

Yes, there can be too much money.

[Lumpy]

Production here at work has ground to a halt. we just bought 20 of the bar-stool racing go-karts and the programmers haven't done a thing since they started shopping at the Ferrari dealerships. If we did not get that $29Mill in venture capitol we would have been still working hard here.

But no. Now we have a 6 hour golf meeting every day for all employees, Caviar and wine spewing drinking fountains.

I heard rumors of $1000 a hour hooker fridays starting next month!

Morale is high, but productivity has dropped way down.

Re:

[Marsala]

I think I know who just set the record for employee referral bonuses for his HR department this quarter....

Re:

[Kjella]

I guess this post got caught in a time warp from the dotcom days. In case it's a two-way connection: Lumpy, the gravy train is coming to an end soon. Enjoy them while you can and save up some for times to come.

Guess I had the wong dotcom...

[NotQuiteReal]

a time warp from the dotcom days

The dotcom I did time with didn't waste their venture money in an obvious fun way... no, my dotcom took the money seriously and made the product more complex, all in the name of "raising the bar for competition", to make the Intellectual Property more unique, etc...

Of course that just ruined a simple "good thing", and it become bloated and so expensive that nobody wanted it...

eh?

[rucs_hack]

Since when are the big players the backbone of Open Source?

Sure, some things will be dominated by commercial needs, they kind of have to be to compete. Anyone who pretends surprise and wants it to be otherwise is deluding themselves.

I've been an Open Source coder for six years now. Last time I checked the state of Red Hat et al made not a mote of difference to my project. I'm pretty certain that I'm not alone.

Re:eh?

[chris_eineke]

Last time I checked the state of Red Hat et al made not a mote of difference to my project.

Is your program written in C? Or is written in a language that uses C as its intermediary? Or is it written in a language whose interpreter was written in C? Then RedHat does made a mote of difference since, afaik, they're one of the bigger contributors to gcc [gnu.org].

Re:

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Since when are the big players the backbone of Open Source?

Erm... Since the big name OSS software (Firefox, OpenOffice, GCC, etc.) were all written mostly by people employed by those big players?

Re:

[bug1]

Since they started being the ones paying the salaries of the key developers in the big projects that are the infrastructure of Open Source, that's when.

According to Linus many eyes make all bugs shallow.

Its the collaboration that makes Free and Open Source software great, not "key developers in big projects"

Re:

[bug1]

Yeah, and we can see how well that's worked for ultra-complex things like the kernel and OpenOffice.

Not so clear to me... are you saying the pay has had a bad effect on the linux kernel ?

OpenOffice started life as proprietary software and i doubt it will ever recover, so i dont think its a good example.

It really comes down to intent doesn't it, some (well, a few) companies accept the responsibility that comes with it, but i guess most just see it as something to exploit. So its not the money thats bad, its

Re:

[bug1]

"How can you argue that these businesses are not the backbone of Open Source when they are the primary source of funding for developer time so many key projects?"

For it to be the backbone implies they system would collapse without them.

Which would be more damaging to the open source software;
a) Key developers in key projects no longer get funding from commercial interests.
b) The hundreds of thousands of volunteers cease their contributions

I think its volunteers that are the backbone, commerc

Are Micro-Breweries Killing Beer?

[darkPHi3er]

Among the many aspects of the Open/Free Source cultures is the essential characteristics of Choice and Free Will.

As we all on /. seem to love, beer, either Metaphorically or Analogously, Did the EXPLOSION of Micro-Breweries in the last decade kill off Beer?

Or did it offer many people the chance to experiment and introduce new types and varieties of beer to an entirely new audience?

Sure, as the the Giant Commercial Software Shops have participated in the process, they have occasionally Big Footed their way through some issues.

Sure, as they have ponied up large numbers of developers and other resources to promote their vision of Open/Free Source, they have inflected the growth and adoption rates of Linux, et al.

But would anyone seriously suggest, for all the real difficulties this has caused, and will cause in the future, without the HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS that the Giants have poured into the world of Free/Open Source, that its adoption, growth and technological improvment would be anywhere near where it is now?????

They Pays Their Monies and They Takes Their Chances.....

I'd say we're all much better off with them, than without them. And those of us who want to work on porting LINUX or Java to our favorite Zilog 80 platform, can spend as much time as we chose to do so. Our own pet projects are, as always, up to to us.

As individual developers and contributors, we are as, "Free to Choose", as we have ever been.

Opensource = Free Speech

[fishthegeek]

The author laments the fact that there are some enterprises that do not contribute to the community yet draw substantial benefit from that same community. This is the same problem we have with free speech in that many people will benefit from the fact that they can speak, and earn a living from that speach (read: Dvorak) yet only a smaller subset of those speaking are actually saying anything that edifies society or benefits it meaningfully. If the FLOSS community is going to espouse freedom then they'll have to suck it up that the leeches are free to use it.

Disclaimer... I personally can't program worth a crap. I get lost in my own 25 line shell scripts so I have to donate in order to contribute (go elive!)

Sinple solution

[jd]

Draw up a league table, but credit all kinds of giving, in relation to their net worth to the community and to their magnitude. I reckon something like 3 points for an application or significant module, 2 for extensive reworking or contributing moderate code, 1 for minor bugfixes and applets, +1 for each significant political or legal hurdle crossed, -1 for every such hurdle added, 2/3 points if it's open source for a closed-source environment, 1/2 points if it is closed source for an open-source environmen

Re:

[xenocide2]

Why bother with all this categorization of what people said they did when ohlo [ohloh.net] goes straight to the point of open source software: the source code.

Re:

[jd]

Because Open Source isn't insular. It exists in a macrocosm, a space filled with a myriad perspectives, beliefs and philosophies, some of which are not Open Source (gasp!) but none-the-less are nurturing and supportive. IBM's DB/2 and Oracle's database are hardly Open Source, yet their credibility has enhanced Linux' credibility. IBM's management and installation tools for Apache were also not Open Source, but it would not surprise me if such tools had played a measurable part in Apache's success story.

Sh

Re:

[The_Wilschon]

So three minor bugfixes are worth a major application? I think the points probably need reworking. Unless of course you meant that for any number of minor bugfixes, you would get one point total? But then why would anyone bother (mod other motivations) making more than one bugfix per year?

Interesting idea, though. Details can always be worked out once the initial idea has been put forth.

Re:Simple solution

[jd]

Yeah, the system needs tweaking. I was thinking of one patch set, which may cover multiple patch releases but where the subsequent updates aren't really "new work", involve "new discoveries" or add anything that wasn't intended by the first patchset. So, ten patches to the same bug - split by files or by time - would be only one patch by my system, unless something radical was discovered in the process. Ten patches to ten different, unrelated, bugs would be considered ten patches.

In part, I was thinking o

It's going to happen

[MrNormS]

Things get commercialized. If there's a profit to be made, it'll happen. As long as the licensing stays GPLish I'm totally okay with it.

Re:

[petrus4]

Of course if restrictions start being attached to the code, if patent threats start adding a layer of threat and restriction to the community then things could be jepordised

Ironically, this is the very reason why I anyway have had reservations about version 3 of the GPL; because of the idea of the FSF incrementally adding more and more restrictions to how licensed software can be used over time. I thought it was particularly telling when I found out that projects hosted on Savannah are not allowed to limit

Good Question, weak article

[Conspicuous Coward]

TFA was weak, I don't think the question of whether a few companies choose to leech off open source projects is really that important to OSS development in the long run.

But in general I think the question of what influence all the money coming into the open source community will have is a good one. If, as is increasingly the case, OSS becomes a key component in the businesses of multi-billion dollar corporations, those corporations will seek to control open source development to protect their investment.
If

Re:

[doti]

TFA was weak

Oh, there was an article to read?

Indeed it's a good question. But the problem is not the corporations that "leech off" open-source. It's when they start hiring all the good coders.

No

[Kjella]

Open source is growing, but it's not killing off its roots, it's just becoming so much more than it once was. There's plenty projects around that are still the same as they ever were, and just because there are commercial projects that go their own way, what does that bother anyone? Very often they contribute userfriendly niceties that are very handy to everyone, but that none of the "hardcore" people would bother implementing. And if someone can make up a business model where they earn money and contribute back, how can that be bad? Companies can turn into bad apples, projects scrapped or get bought out but the source lives on. If you feel the commercial interests are a problem, fork it and break new ground. I don't really care if the code came from RMS himself or a salaried in-it-for-the-money employee at Red Hat. The freedoms are the same, in particular the freedom to use their code to scratch your itch. In the end, isn't that what matters?

No, open source is growing

[bit01]

Spending money is orthogonal to openness. Mainstream money has simply increased the size of the pie.

As open source becomes more mainstream more mainstream companies more money will get involved. No surprises there.

Niche programmers with free time will continue to scratch their itch. No surprises their either.

The two groups exist together quite happily. Most open source programmers want their work to become more mainstream.

It's only when companies try to do an end-run around open licenses that there's problems and that's exactly the same issue as proprietary software licenses being abused.

---

DRM. You don't control it means you don't own it.

Money flowing into open source? Ha!

[Rahga]

Such a bunch of hot air.... I've done my time in a handful of projects, and would love to get more done and a lot of rough edges squared away in a very specific, visual spot of the desktop. My problem was lack of money... not just the fact that what I was doing had almost no ties to any "open-source money" at all, but the market has been quite a dog, and in my town I took a year away from programming and IT work to try my hand in the production department of a newspaper, in all places. Switching careers like that can kill motivation on an open-source project.

Without getting too personal, all I will say is that the vast majority money invested into open source is anything but... It's invested into companies that have a handful of people working on a handful of high-profile cases, usually doing a 20% job: 20% on open source, and 80% on projects that actually bring in cash.

Now, back to the article, those links support anything but what the /. post is talking about. Nagios being abused, and commercializtion of software itself killing open source... Taking open source projects and investing in project that build on top of that foundation.

There's no such thing as too much money

[Arthur B.]

Because you have a free option on money. You don't want it? Don't use it. You want it? Use it. It's plain simple. I see people complaining about money in the movie business. Well I saw plenty of expensive movies which I enjoyed very much, and plenty of inexpensive which I enjoyed as well. Some good things need money to be done, some don't. Money is just a tool of exchange, it has no intrinsic characteristic, it merely reflects that of his owner. Someone despising money is really despising his own goals and

Answer

[ishmalius]

No.

(well, I can't think of a better response to such a silly question)

Open Source != Free Software

[Snospar]

In all this discussion of Big Business "Open Source" software let's tip our hats to the thousands of Debian Developers who help keep software FREE. Not just free in monetary terms, free of the stranglehold that big business can place on software development when they decide to move on to the next big thing.

I hope big business keep pumping money into worthwhile open source projects. I really hope they truly support free software. I'm smart enough to know that at least some of these players are only in it to foister some competition against the Microsoft camp and whether that is good enough for the community remains to be seen.

Re:

[petrus4]

In all this discussion of Big Business "Open Source" software let's tip our hats to the thousands of Debian Developers who help keep software FREE. Not just free in monetary terms, free of the stranglehold that big business can place on software development when they decide to move on to the next big thing.

What about Gentoo, Fedora, Linux From Scratch, Gobolinux, and Blag? (To name but a few other non-commercial Linux distros) Don't they count too?

Debian is *not* the only non-commercial Linux distribution

Re:

[mvdwege]

What about Gentoo, Fedora, Linux From Scratch, Gobolinux, and Blag? (To name but a few other non-commercial Linux distros) Don't they count too?

Nope, they don't.

You could have taken the hint from the use the parent poster made of capitals. He even did you the favour of explicitly spelling out what he meant. Apparently, you can't read.

Here's an explanation for those who can read: parent poster was referring to Free, as in 'Free Speech', not free as in 'no cost'.

Geez, it is not as if this is a new distin

Re:

[petrus4]

Here's an explanation for those who can read: parent poster was referring to Free, as in 'Free Speech', not free as in 'no cost'.

Ah. Of course. He meant that Debian is the only distro in existence with explicit approval from Stallman's cult. My apologies for the misconception.

However, with gnuSense, even that is no longer strictly true.

Re:

[juhaz]

Fedora is Free. Arguably more so than Debian since there's no official non-free repo.

Geez, it's not as if checking how moronic you sound (hint: very) while resorting to personal attacks on trivia while being badly wrong yourself is a new thing.

esoteric knowledge in the open source community

[bariswheel]

What worries me is you don't have to release your code unless you are planning to sell your software under the laws of the GPL. This is something that many open source advocates misconcieve.

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[doti]

But if you use GPL in your software, then your software has to be GPL too. So you can't turn free code into a closed product. That's the "viral" part of the license.

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[setagllib]

Tell that to BSD projects, who use GPL code extensively but retain the BSD license on most of their code. It's a pragmatic approach - they can keep most of the code truly free (BSD) and still make use of the virally free (GPL) projects that are virtually irreplacable. That's because 3-clause BSD is GPL-compatible. You can cut a binary distribution of a BSD with no GPL code, and hack it up for embedded development, as many companies do. You can debate until the heat-death of the universe about whether GPL or

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[bariswheel]

Meaning if you don't 'distribute' your software, you can keep the gpl code to yourself. I suppose I haven't fully wrapped my head around what 'distribution' exactly means. Let's say you're using Yahoo software, lives on their server, and say they're using GPL code in that software. Serving this software out to the web, would it be fair to say they are 'distributing' this software? Or are we talking about permanently distributing the binaries to users for keeps? Obviously Yahoo isn't interested in giving awa

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[account_deleted]

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Er.

[stonecypher]

Open source products are making inroads in most vertical markets, deposing commercial product after commercial product. Their user base is soaring, their legitimacy is solidifying, their media presence is expanding. It's actively difficult to find servers that aren't open source.

Exactly what definition of "killing" are we working by, again?

Money won't kill open source, but greed will...

[nologin]

A lot of projects have benefitted from having some money behind them. The article cites several examples, so I don't have to. But, if a open source project is really going to be threatened, it is likely not only because of the money, but also because of greed.

Do we need a better reminder than SCO to demonstrate that greed is what would kill open source? And while their recent actions seem limited to their legal battle against Linux, this same company used to be called Caldera (and was selling a Linux distribution of their own).

So, if there is an issue of too much money in open source, it really comes down to whether that money is being justly used to support the development of open source products or if that money is being used to line a greedy manager's/executive's pockets.

Quick answer: No

[Sigma 7]

Will money flowing into open source destroy its roots?

If there is no money flowing into open source, the programmers will be limited to those who have time on their hands. This forces the exclusion of students undertaking exams, programmers with girlfriends, professional programmers bound by contracts [slashdot.org], and so on. In addition, hosting resources will be limited to "free" services or be on the dime of the maintainer(s) - which will result in some problems if the project gets Slashdotted.

For open source to become more popular, money must flow in. The result is that some projects request donations to keep the project alive.

Now, I'll play devil's advocate for a second - would you prefer a version of Firefox that isn't up to modern standards (i.e. bloated, memory leaks, CPU hog, and won't render properly), or would you spend money to make it the best browser (i.e. lightning fast, lightweight, and perfect rendering)? I've considered allowing you to spend time to help the browser, but a project the size of Firefox isn't something that most programmers can jump into.

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[pipingguy]

programmers with girlfriends

Too easy, I refuse to comment.

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[einhverfr]

I agree with all your points and would add one more point and one caveat.

For open source projects to be long-term viable, they have to be more than about the itch of the current moment. This means often you need to have paying customers who pay you to solve their problems. And money flows in this way.

The caveat I would add is that there is such a thing as too much money, though perhaps this is better phrased as "there is such a thing as one entity having too much money." If a company has money, they will

Commercial open source is natural and instinctive

[postbigbang]

LinuxLand is filled with great solid hacks. People, like Linus, put together code sets based on affinity and desire and a lot of blood/sweat/tears/tribulation and just plain brain power. So much the better. Stallman put together a pure kit of utilities that mimed the functionality of core Unix components. He did it for free, and forever free. So much the better.

It's ok to put money into these things to advance them and move them along. Money will follow good code that people need (ok, maybe some bad code, t

Commercialization? No

[iminplaya]

Only one thing can hurt open source. Licensing. Too many licenses. Enough to make a lawyer jump for joy. Unless I'm a law firm, I would have great difficulty deciding to use OSS in my business. So far it's ok in the server market, but as more desktop apps come in from a wider variety of programmers, each with their own silly little license, it can only spell trouble. The solution is easy and obvious, but won't come about for many years, due to plain old stubbornness.

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[shish]

How do you deal with all the closed source licences?

If "destroying its roots" means

[imsabbel]

that i dont have to suscripe to the cult to use it, then hell yeah, go for it!

False dilemma

[Anonymous Coward]

What a lot of people don't realize is that companies that rely on projects like Nagios have a huge incentive for the project to continue, even if they don't contribute. If the original contributors decided to quit, these companies would have to pick up the slack, meaning that these projects are much more likely to continue as companies invest in 'improvements', even if those improvements are not contributed to the original code base.

Also, projects aren't 'punished' when companies take the code and run with

Depends what is given back

[gilesjuk]

If IBM and others take open source code, test it, fix bugs and return the code back to the author then this is good surely?

Also, many drivers for hardware come from employees at large organisations. Without drivers your choice of hardware for Linux would be severely limited.

Partially, yes

[AlXtreme]

When you pump cash into an open source project, the volunteers will tend to leave or their effort will diminish (why would they invest their precious time, if others are paid to do exactly the same?). Linux is different in this aspect, as companies focus their efforts on separate modules or internal sections of the kernel (the parts that matter to them), but the percentage of volunteer-developers has dropped over the last decade.

It's an interesting problem. I've looked into bounty-offerings from certain pro

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[petrus4]

When you pump cash into an open source project, the volunteers will tend to leave or their effort will diminish (why would they invest their precious time, if others are paid to do exactly the same?).

I see this continually with Linux...over and over and over again. It's never about what an individual themselves are doing. Rather, the rule is always, "I am my brother's keeper."

Here's a thought:- Instead of focusing constantly on whether everyone else is "giving back," whether everyone else is being paid

as long as they get the licenses right

[nanosquid]

I really don't care what people's motives are for developing open source software as long as they get the licenses right. Any of the common open source licenses will do: GPL, BSD, LGPL, Apache, etc.

The only real problem I occasionally see with commercial open source is dual licensed software, which may be nominally under an open source license, but is usually run as a closed source project and often has unexpected hidden costs.

Sys-con article from an anonymous reader?

[walterbyrd]

You gotta be kidding. Anybody would take such an article seriously would have to very ignorant about open source, and have a poor sense of logic.

Re:Wasn't the right kind of licence going to fix t

[ricree]

Yeah, the author was pretty unclear on this. Certainly, using the GPL or something similar will prevent companies from legally leaching too much off of the project. At any rate, it insures that any changes the company makes should be able to find their way back to the project itself. Of course, this can still be violated, at which point it becomes a legal question. Honestly, this is one of the big reasons that I disagree with many people who favor BSD style licenses. If that's what you want for your code, then it's all well and good, but don't ever complain about leaching, since the license gives complete permission to go ahead and do that.

Re:Wasn't the right kind of licence going to fix t

[NovaX]

BSD developers don't complain, but in fact see it as a compliment. Their philosophy is that the license promotes the distribution of good code. (And if you have ever worked as a developer, then you'd know that by and large, good code is rare)

I have seen GPL supporters whine and pretend that somehow BSD code in proprietary systems is suddenly no longer free. There was quite a bit of FUD by the FSF regarding FreeBSD, claiming that the FreeBSD Foundation could go private and leave companies locked in. This was of course when FreeBSD was seen as more mature than Linux, and we had the SVLUG making quite a number of outlandish stunts trying to get Linux publicity. So many GPL supporters are pretty well known for publically stating their beliefs are better and all others are simply wrong.

Please remember, leaching to you is a compliment to others. Some of us enjoy doing good work and simply want to be appreciated for it (aka the Beer license).

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[chromatic]

BSD developers don't complain, but in fact see it as a compliment.

The OpenSSH developers certainly complained.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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[ricree]

I have seen GPL supporters whine and pretend that somehow BSD code in proprietary systems is suddenly no longer free. There was quite a bit of FUD by the FSF regarding FreeBSD, claiming that the FreeBSD Foundation could go private and leave companies locked in. This was of course when FreeBSD was seen as more mature than Linux, and we had the SVLUG making quite a number of outlandish stunts trying to get Linux publicity. So many GPL supporters are pretty well known for publically stating their beliefs are b

Re:Wasn't the right kind of licence going to fix t

[Dr_Marvin_Monroe]

I'm not sure that analogy is applicable. As pointed out in "C&B," the "commons" problem is that the value of the commons diminishes as more animals grazed there. In software, having other folks use (even if they never return anything) doesn't diminish your value of the software in any fashion.

With commercial software, the value is only in it's artificial scarcity. As AOL has demonstrated, we could blanket the earth in install CD's, so the supply/demand price of the software enclosed approaches zero.

I don't see any problem with it (companies using without returning everything/anything). They'll help fix the common roads when it's in their interest to do so. With more companies using OS software, they'll eventually end up using more of the "common roads" too.

Don't worry, they'll get around to it once all this IP nonsense is settled.

 

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[YrWrstNtmr]

As AOL has demonstrated, we could blanket the earth in install CD's, so the supply/demand price of the software enclosed approaches zero.

I don't know if usung AOL as a standard is a good thing. Yes, they were 'successful', even to the point of buying TimeWarner, but only because soooo many people are/were clueless.

You have to blanket the earth with good stuff*. Even then, I'm not sure the 'clueless ones' will not screw it up.

* for various definitions of good stuff.

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[leenks]

AOL sucked way before they bought out Time Warner...

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[Fred_A]

AOL sucked way before they bought out Time Warner...

GP poster is obviously too young to have met AOL or their users back then... Like when they first invaded Usenet. Between the users, the fact that *each* "Me Too" post was posted *twice* for a while, they made a reputation in no time...

Be fair to AOL, they started out with a

[falconwolf]

better price.

No, Compuserve, and The Well [well.com], were better products. However AOL's marketing beat Compuserve after which AOL bought it and The Well dropped it's access and went to just being an online community instead of also offering access.

Falcon

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[mattkime]

>>In software, having other folks use doesn't diminish your value of the software in any fashion.

While the animals are consuming something that can be copied infinitely, strangely, they still poop.

I think we can all agree that the poop has been piled pretty high.

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[buswolley]

We all have cherished eras. Move on.

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[corychristison]

If I want an OS that Just Works, I go with Mac OS X.

I recently purchased a Mac Mini for my girlfriend a few months ago. I've been playing with it while she's not around [eg: at school]. I've found a lot of things do work okay, however if you want to do anything useful, it usually requires buying a product, trying to compile/port a program from Linux or it's just not easily possible.

A couple of examples: watching a video in Safari(switched to firefox and used the MediaPlayerConnectivity plugin as I use

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[account_deleted]

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