How the Cloud is Changing OSS Licensing

Brian looks at the recent changes in open source licensing, as it relates to managed cloud offerings, and how the perception of end-users towards free software vs. cloud services is changing.

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SHOW NOTES

• Server Side Public License (SSPL)
• What does Open Source mean in the Era of Cloud APIs? (Redmonk)
• Cockroach and the Source Available Future (Redmonk)
• MongoDB Cloud, MongoDB vs. AWS, MongoDB’s Playbook (Stratechery)
• Doubling Down on Open (Elastic)
• Evolution of Commercial OSS (The Cloudcast, Eps.492)

THINGS WE KNOW

• Open Source has become a mainstream source for innovation - with most of the Internet being built on OSS technologies (in some way or form)
• Open Source is more widely used in the Enterprise (than in the past), beyond just Linux
• Open Source is often the de facto choice for much of the public cloud (OS, VMs, DBs, etc.)
• The need for a “free” experience is expected for anything new in software or cloud, whether that’s for any/all usage, or a fixed period of time. 
• “Open core”, or other variations on free OSS + non OSS (non-free) features has been a concept for quite a while. 
• Community driven development does bring a broad set of perspectives, and it distributes the workload across engineers, companies, etc.
• Plenty of successful projects have been both Open Source and primarily driven by a single company (especially in the data-centric projects)

THINGS THAT WILL EVOLVE

• Where does the value of software come from? Does it come from the features, from the distribution, from the creator(s), or from how it is run?
• Do customers value ‘free”, or “stability” or “customizability” (features) or “operationalization”? 
• How much of an advantage or disadvantage (or neutral) is the OSS companies offering cloud services across clouds? 

UNKNOWNS AND UNCERTAINTIES

• How will the VC community view the changes in competitive landscape and licensing? How does it impact their future funding models?

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