To open source or not to open source? That is the question!
Posted: Mon Mar 30, 2009 2:52 pm
A blog friend commented on my latest post today asking if the CMS I'm working on is open source. I've read a lot about the benefits of open source but the big fat issue at hand is my only bread and butter: by opening what I am working on what my future business will rely on will be easily accessible to any one who is capable of using copy and paste. I am stranded in Florida not living here by choice and there just isn't any PHP/MySQL web community/economy/etc. The only way I can see getting myself out of a rut is by building an online business that will include the CMS I'm working on. Have other people been able to profit from their own work even if part, most, or even all of it at one point became open source? What are examples of where people were both successful and unsuccessful in such a pursuit?
There are of course other issues which are secondary. First and foremost I'm a designer learning development, not vice versa. Frameworks are kryptonite to my coding ethics and I know little if anything about how open source projects work as far as online collaboration is concerned. Ultimately this will become Version 2.9 of my website, the twenty-ninth version and the "JAB" in JAB Creations stands for my initials...so in effect while I'm open to people collaborating and using my work to an extent I do not wish to have the goals manipulated in to something else. I imagine that ends up becoming an issue of how open source project sites are constructed.
I'm open to arguments both for and against but right now I have to presume what I'm doing will be my only source of bread and butter in the future.
There are of course other issues which are secondary. First and foremost I'm a designer learning development, not vice versa. Frameworks are kryptonite to my coding ethics and I know little if anything about how open source projects work as far as online collaboration is concerned. Ultimately this will become Version 2.9 of my website, the twenty-ninth version and the "JAB" in JAB Creations stands for my initials...so in effect while I'm open to people collaborating and using my work to an extent I do not wish to have the goals manipulated in to something else. I imagine that ends up becoming an issue of how open source project sites are constructed.
I'm open to arguments both for and against but right now I have to presume what I'm doing will be my only source of bread and butter in the future.