Ask HN: Can a Successful Open Source Project Run by a Company Stay Open Source?

1 points by michaelbrave 8y ago ↗ HN

So Reddit just announced that they are no longer as committed to open source as they previously were. https://www.reddit.com/r/changelog/comments/6xfyfg/an_update_on_the_state_of_the_redditreddit_and/

After this and what happened to MakerBot, (Apple built on open source tech too) I'm curious if this is just the way things have to be, that as investment increases openness will decrease?

I want to believe in open source, but recent history feels disheartening.

1 comment

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frantzmiccoli 8y ago ↗

You have a few counter examples to that : Wordpress, Ubuntu or CentOS. I guess it's unfair to count Android and Chrome here.

For a lot of companies, open source / community edition is a great way to do efficient marketing. For some it does work pretty well, people test your thing, they like it and end up needing services around that. Acquiring users / customers is such a tough job that getting it done through open source is a bargain for a lot of them.