Ask HN: Should I make my project open source to get users?

Re:Ask HN: Should I make my project open source to get users? by SunghoYahng on Thursday March 19, 2020 @03:44AM (#22625415)

That's so clear. Thank you. The words "consumers' solution solves nothing" touched my heart. However, I have no idea about how to solve the data retention problem except for being open source.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Should I make my project open source to get users? by lonelappde on Thursday March 19, 2020 @12:03PM (#22628739)

Let the users download their data in a readable format. That's all you need.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Should I make my project open source to get users? by troydavis on Thursday March 19, 2020 @04:02AM (#22625490)

> However, I have no idea about how to solve the data retention problem except for being open source.

Make it good enough and few people will have that concern, and even fewer will decline to use it because of that. Look at GitHub, Trello, Todoist, and many others; they all started as tiny web apps without much trust.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Should I make my project open source to get users? by SunghoYahng on Thursday March 19, 2020 @04:13AM (#22625539)

This seems right, provided that I can make the product good enough. It would be a much harder way to make it good enough than to make it opensource and gather users.

I should consider whether the early startup even without funding can afford to choose that path.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Should I make my project open source to get users? by SunghoYahng on Thursday March 19, 2020 @04:06AM (#22625505)

Maybe that's right. Thank you very much

[ Parent | on HN ]