Why you should build an open-source startup

Re:Why you should build an open-source startup by rick888 on Friday May 20, 2011 @04:08PM (#2569257)

"Take a standalone product like Camtasia. It works really well and its worth the money to buy it. But if it was FOSS and I could just donwload the sources, build and it use it, and only had to pay for support -- well I probably would never buy it. I've never needed support with it. It's so easy to use, I've never had a need for support (in fact, that's partially why I'm willing to pay for it!)."

Not only this, but anyone could build and maintain a free version and make it so the average user doesn't need to even compile it.

Open sourcing an app doesn't really make sense for a business. You will be making it easier for competitors to put you out of business.

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Re:Why you should build an open-source startup by kenjackson on Friday May 20, 2011 @04:18PM (#2569294)

True. I hadn't even posed that doomsday scenario. Imagine if MS made Windows and Office FOSS, what would happen? Exactly as you state, Google would build it and make it a free binary download and offer free support of it (probably replacing IE with Chrome, and Google as the search default). This would effectively kill MS and Google wouldn't have to worry about MS funding Bing through Windows and Office.

EDIT: And to be clear, that's largely what Google's Chrome/Docs strategy is. The total revenue from it isn't very large, even if it is a success. The real win is chopping down the core revenue of someone who wants to chop down their core revenue (search revenue). But today Google has to build this all. If MS did FOSS, MS would be handing Google the keys.

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