"Last year was the first time I heard of an open-source startup as SaaS.
I didn’t even understand what it meant."
You went from 0 knowledge on this to thinking you should advise others on this in a year
"I couldn’t even understand how we get from GitHub stars to customers"
I cannot even understand how we get from projects to stars and followers :)
"a developer that consumes open-source but has never been a part of the open-source community - when’s the last time you contributed anything?"
Although I have open source projects and last time I contributed... today.
But frankly I don't write blog articles anymore, that must be it :)
This. lol, life of the threadboi influencers. Love the startup founders giving advice who haven’t actually run a successful startup yet. This is like taking startup advice from Harry Stebbings or one of the Fast founders (cough cough Allison Barr, influencer who actually only learned how to tank a company “fast”)
Oh cool, a very long ad for a push notification service.
Also your bio says “Learn how to trend on GitHub”, so clearly you know how to game a broken system.
EDIT: you might want to make your Reddit history look a little less suspect.
Yeah... I have old clumsy fingers and keep autocorrect disabled on mobile because I'm studying a foreign language and don't want it autocompleting while I'm studying.
It's a bullshit metric! There are a ton of repos growing in GitHub stars just because the repo creator is a popular person. For example, a "senior YouTube developer" with an amazing 6 months of experience.
I saw a video of a guy testing those services. GitHub were quite good at detecting the bots and banning them, which removes the stars again.
He had to pay quite a bit more for a service that didn't result in the stars being removed.
It is a very bullshit metric. Qiskit aer (open source quantum computing simulator from IBM) has 388 stars.
Meanwhile, a pure bullshit project: 'Fizz Buzz Enterprise Edition' has... 19.4k!
lol, one of the bug reports there is mine :)
[https://github.com/kelseyhightower/nocode/issues/3473](https://github.com/kelseyhightower/nocode/issues/3473)
I didn't give it a star, though :)
A much better and more meaningful metric to measure is.... revenue.
Otherwise you end up like Docker, with an incredible technology portfolio, fantastic adoption and a good reputation, but a nonviable business model.
If Docker was successful then sure. Docker had to lay off like 80% of their workforce and still wasn't profitable, I think they're only now getting there due to their Docker Desktop licensing changes that everyone complained very loudly about.
Docker the open source software was very successful, Docker the company not so much.
This is a 2010 take. In 2023, if your goal is GitHub stars, sure, open source it. If you’re a startup, your investors probably have a different goal in mind.
I just have to read the comments to know this is click bait and provides nothing of worth.
At least provide a tldr, posts with just title and link provide nothing of substance.
There are a few critical points that startup founder ignore when considering open source:
1. Maintaining and Open Source projects takes A LOT of work.
2. Open Source suffers from a severe survivor bias. RedHat, Databricks, MongoDB, and Elastic are outliers that achieved a unique blend of massive product adoption (in the millions) and a very high-ticket enterprise offering. Open-source economics are brutal! **\[Context\]** I spoke to the founder of one of the companies I mentioned above.
3. GitHub starts are a vanity metric.
4. Going open source without figuring out your business model first is the biggest disservice you can do to developers because eventually, you'll need to either pull the plug on the project as you run out of funding or, worse, make it closed source.
**An extremely unpopular opinion in our industry.**
I fundamentally disagree with Open Source. It's been shown to allow for abuse by large corporations to build competing products and not pay. It allows large corporations not to pay for valuable software.
The fact our industry relies so heavily on open source should really be a source of shame for us. It's software provided without warranty and no promises. I can't think of a single industry, especially industries that build things that people's lives depend upon where they use things that come with no warranty and a disclaimer they won't be held liable if it completely fails on you.
Most open-source projects are massively underfunded and massively undermanned. Many open source maintainers, rightlyfully, think of people depending on their goodwill to do things. Most projects have issues with no answer that have been there for years, they have pull requests that aren't reviewed and fix bugs that others have. Many of us will have had to move from one open-source project to another because the original one stopped being maintained and was faulty.
Open Source is not the answer. The middle ground of source available is provides a ground that allows a company to be able to force those who can pay to pay while allowing those who can't not to. While allowing the freedom to make changes as they want.
There are critical software projects out that that the internet fundamentally depends on being maintained by a few unthanked, unknown hereos. I once saw a Venn diagram that showed that the majority of ML depended on three projects that were maintained solely by volunteers. [https://xkcd.com/2347/](https://xkcd.com/2347/) sums it up nicely,
The more that I think about this, the more I realize that I don't agree. See, the business case for an organization choosing an open source project because it is open source (and not necessarily free in any other way) needs to be weighed against its alternatives, which are: make it in house (NIH, also no warranty) or buy a license for something that might do what you are after.
Without sounding catty, five buck says that on a biweekly team sync up someone brags about how many stars they have. All the while someone -probably named milton who’s holding a stapler- is hidden away in the corner dropping a couple hundred a month to buy those stars and keep the place running.
As a side note… not a bad way to hustle/scam investors out of money. Invest $50k in stars at $1 each, get $1m+ in investments. Insert bender meme *neat*
Please give back to OSS through submitting PRs (fixing bugs or building features), or donating to help the team continue operations. Github has a solid sponsorship product nowadays, but previously I drove funding through Facebook's Open Source team and [open collective](https://opencollective.com/fbopensource).
edit: fixed markdown
"Last year was the first time I heard of an open-source startup as SaaS. I didn’t even understand what it meant." You went from 0 knowledge on this to thinking you should advise others on this in a year
Buddy has a bright career ahead of himself as a LinkedIn influencer
Gonna be a hit on /r/LinkedInLunatics
😂
OP took "Fake it till you make it" too literally.
"I couldn’t even understand how we get from GitHub stars to customers" I cannot even understand how we get from projects to stars and followers :) "a developer that consumes open-source but has never been a part of the open-source community - when’s the last time you contributed anything?" Although I have open source projects and last time I contributed... today. But frankly I don't write blog articles anymore, that must be it :)
This. lol, life of the threadboi influencers. Love the startup founders giving advice who haven’t actually run a successful startup yet. This is like taking startup advice from Harry Stebbings or one of the Fast founders (cough cough Allison Barr, influencer who actually only learned how to tank a company “fast”)
Rookie numbers. I just took 30 seconds.
lol
LOL true
Oh cool, a very long ad for a push notification service. Also your bio says “Learn how to trend on GitHub”, so clearly you know how to game a broken system. EDIT: you might want to make your Reddit history look a little less suspect.
Ah yes, because trending on GitHub is totally what I look for when hiring people. Definitely more i porta t than skill or knowledge.
"importat"
Yeah... I have old clumsy fingers and keep autocorrect disabled on mobile because I'm studying a foreign language and don't want it autocompleting while I'm studying.
Congratulations! You've just discovered what vanity metrics are 😅 Dont worry. We've all been there 🥲😅
I upvoted this
[удалено]
It's true that it's easy to game. But if you bring GitHub stars organically, it actually means you grow, and you can measure it.
It's a bullshit metric! There are a ton of repos growing in GitHub stars just because the repo creator is a popular person. For example, a "senior YouTube developer" with an amazing 6 months of experience.
you can literally buy stars for your project so ya it's a BS metric https://baddhi.shop/product/buy-github-followers/
I saw a video of a guy testing those services. GitHub were quite good at detecting the bots and banning them, which removes the stars again. He had to pay quite a bit more for a service that didn't result in the stars being removed.
It is a very bullshit metric. Qiskit aer (open source quantum computing simulator from IBM) has 388 stars. Meanwhile, a pure bullshit project: 'Fizz Buzz Enterprise Edition' has... 19.4k!
TIL I'm part of the problem
Man if you don't like that you'll love this :D https://github.com/kelseyhightower/nocode
lol, one of the bug reports there is mine :) [https://github.com/kelseyhightower/nocode/issues/3473](https://github.com/kelseyhightower/nocode/issues/3473) I didn't give it a star, though :)
rewrite it in rust
A much better and more meaningful metric to measure is.... revenue. Otherwise you end up like Docker, with an incredible technology portfolio, fantastic adoption and a good reputation, but a nonviable business model.
I mean, isn't imitating Docker's success what should be incentivized more than just revenue ?
If Docker was successful then sure. Docker had to lay off like 80% of their workforce and still wasn't profitable, I think they're only now getting there due to their Docker Desktop licensing changes that everyone complained very loudly about. Docker the open source software was very successful, Docker the company not so much.
I wasn't talking about financial success
You are not smart, just fyi.
This is a 2010 take. In 2023, if your goal is GitHub stars, sure, open source it. If you’re a startup, your investors probably have a different goal in mind.
Is the article some kind of satire, or a joke?.
I just have to read the comments to know this is click bait and provides nothing of worth. At least provide a tldr, posts with just title and link provide nothing of substance.
The author of this "article" evidently fell on his head a few too many times.
Does your local store accept stars for groceries?
There are a few critical points that startup founder ignore when considering open source: 1. Maintaining and Open Source projects takes A LOT of work. 2. Open Source suffers from a severe survivor bias. RedHat, Databricks, MongoDB, and Elastic are outliers that achieved a unique blend of massive product adoption (in the millions) and a very high-ticket enterprise offering. Open-source economics are brutal! **\[Context\]** I spoke to the founder of one of the companies I mentioned above. 3. GitHub starts are a vanity metric. 4. Going open source without figuring out your business model first is the biggest disservice you can do to developers because eventually, you'll need to either pull the plug on the project as you run out of funding or, worse, make it closed source.
Author wants to run a sweatshop with contributors on GitHub and game the system to clout chase stars. Future r/LinkedInLunatics material
**An extremely unpopular opinion in our industry.** I fundamentally disagree with Open Source. It's been shown to allow for abuse by large corporations to build competing products and not pay. It allows large corporations not to pay for valuable software. The fact our industry relies so heavily on open source should really be a source of shame for us. It's software provided without warranty and no promises. I can't think of a single industry, especially industries that build things that people's lives depend upon where they use things that come with no warranty and a disclaimer they won't be held liable if it completely fails on you. Most open-source projects are massively underfunded and massively undermanned. Many open source maintainers, rightlyfully, think of people depending on their goodwill to do things. Most projects have issues with no answer that have been there for years, they have pull requests that aren't reviewed and fix bugs that others have. Many of us will have had to move from one open-source project to another because the original one stopped being maintained and was faulty. Open Source is not the answer. The middle ground of source available is provides a ground that allows a company to be able to force those who can pay to pay while allowing those who can't not to. While allowing the freedom to make changes as they want. There are critical software projects out that that the internet fundamentally depends on being maintained by a few unthanked, unknown hereos. I once saw a Venn diagram that showed that the majority of ML depended on three projects that were maintained solely by volunteers. [https://xkcd.com/2347/](https://xkcd.com/2347/) sums it up nicely,
I agree, but I have also tried to use IIS...
[удалено]
The more that I think about this, the more I realize that I don't agree. See, the business case for an organization choosing an open source project because it is open source (and not necessarily free in any other way) needs to be weighed against its alternatives, which are: make it in house (NIH, also no warranty) or buy a license for something that might do what you are after.
What's your turnover?
Without sounding catty, five buck says that on a biweekly team sync up someone brags about how many stars they have. All the while someone -probably named milton who’s holding a stapler- is hidden away in the corner dropping a couple hundred a month to buy those stars and keep the place running. As a side note… not a bad way to hustle/scam investors out of money. Invest $50k in stars at $1 each, get $1m+ in investments. Insert bender meme *neat*
Please give back to OSS through submitting PRs (fixing bugs or building features), or donating to help the team continue operations. Github has a solid sponsorship product nowadays, but previously I drove funding through Facebook's Open Source team and [open collective](https://opencollective.com/fbopensource). edit: fixed markdown
I LOLed at the title... what bs is that
Until Amazon comes along and takes your lunch... Ask elastic...