Closed vs Open source

[nashattan]

I have a general question. I have made a piece of software that is pretty useful right now and has the potential to become much more powerful and polished. What I'm struggling with is the direction to take it. Should I release it under an open source license and let the community play with it or finish it off myself and try to sell it?

On one hand, I love the open source community and want to support it as much as possible. I've used a lot of open source programs and projects, and I want to give something back.

On the other hand, I'm a poor college student with at least 2.5 years of tuition left to scrounge up.

Give me some more arguments from either side. In general, when should one release a program to the community and when is it a better idea to close it off and sell?

[oz]

Welcome to the forums!

That's really a matter of personal choice and for you to decide.

Coming here and asking that on a forum full of users that thrive on open source projects, don't you think that most of those responding might recommend open sourcing it?

Best of luck with it either way.

[rokytnji]

If survival is most paramount at the moment. Then opt for survival. One can give back later after survival is taken care of.

That being said, I was always donating my free time and expertise for free fixing motorcycles, and years later am not the worse off for doing it. In fact I have quite a following for doing so.

You decide which is more important. Fame or money.

[nashattan]

Well, I figured this forum might be a little biased, but what I'm really after is what reasons other people would have for doing one or the other. I'm looking for anything I failed to account for earlier.

[meton_magis]

Well, the one boon to open source, is that it may help in the future with getting employment. If you truly have an outstanding product (worth paying for ) then you will have a VERY strong resume. Even after the community imrpoves your product to a very shiny polish, it is still YOUR program. YOU will get the main credit for it. Look at Sam Lantinga (think I spelled it right.) He made SDL, now he is working for blizzard. Arguably one of the best game companies at the moment.

Also, depending on how good and what it is, you may be able to sell support for it at a later date.

Obviously arguments against this are money, but sometimes you take a loss on one thing, to make a profit on another.

[darkrose0510]

Don't forget that just because it's open source doesn't mean you can't sell it. There's no reason why you can't release the source under the GPL, and sell the binaries. You'd probably end up with a much more saleable product once it's been worked on by a community rather than just one person.

[Surak]

1. Open source it to a select group of people
2. Sell it
3. ???
4. PROFIT!!!

[L4Linux]

If your program becomes successful, then you 'll make money either way. By selling it if it is closed source or by getting employed to a company like Red Hat, Novell, Google,etc with a very good salary. Or by selling your company & copyrights to such a company, like Mark Shuttleworth sold Thawte to Google for 800 million $!! (not very sure for the exact amount, but it has hundreds of millions)

Does your program has strong competition from other similar products (proprietary or OSS)? If it is in a congested category, then you may have a hard time selling it without community developers helping you make it even better. But you can try ofcourse and see if it succeeds. And you can always open source it later.

[nashattan]

Thanks guys! I think I have a better perspective of the issue now. I appreciate it!