Bitbucket.org

[Jesper Noehr]

On Aug 1, 2008, at 11:22 AM, Paul R wrote:
> On Fri, 1 Aug 2008 10:51:04 +0200, Jesper Noehr <jesper at noehr.org>  
> said:
> Paul> So maybe you can develop on : "Why do you beleive your incomes
> Paul> are more guaranteed if you don't share the program ?"
>
> Jesper> Because if we release the source, nothing keeps other people
> Jesper> from launching their own Bitbucket instance and charging lower
> Jesper> fees (or doing it for free, for that matter.)
>
> As you previously said, hardware and employees are not free of charge.
> So I doubt somebody else can provide BitBucket service with the same
> quality for free.

Yep. My point was also that we need to make money to keep the product  
running.

>
> Jesper>  I'm a firm believer in open source, and I would like to
> Jesper> release the source to the public, but there are certain
> Jesper> aspects to that which would make it a bad decision.
>
> You are probably aware of the Affero GPL [1]. If BitBucket software
> became public, using such a licence would ensure your company, Jesper,
> would benefit from any work done on the software by an external
> contributor, be him an individual or a company. In such a model,
> AvantLumiere would concentrate its business on hosting and integration
> to provide the best experience.

I was not aware of this license, actually. Thanks for pointing it out!

> Jesper> That being said, there is possibility that we will release the
> Jesper> source later on, after we have (hopefully) gained some
> Jesper> marketshare, and don't have to struggle to be noticed.
>
> One of the known way to gain publicy and market shares is to
> distribute the program so that lowly skilled system administrators can
> install it and play with it. Then you offer the best paid hosting
> available, and companies with serious requirements but bad (or no)
> system administrators buy it. A free plan on your hosted service also
> serves that purpose pretty well, indeed.

That's a good point. This is my first software that is "closed  
source", which is also why this is all new territory to us. It's very  
possible that open sourcing it under a license like the one you  
propose, is a better way to go. Time will tell, I guess.


Jesper