HACKER Q&A
📣 Alupis

Why Doesn't Red Hat Fold CentOS and Make RHEL Free?


Now that CentOS has official Red Hat backing - why continue the CentOS project at all? Why not just make RHEL free for download and use - and sell support contracts?

This is close to what Red Hat already does - and seems it might align more potential users. If you're using free CentOS, and get into a jam - there's no-one to call for support, other than forums and your knowledge. But, if you had RHEL proper, and got into a jam - you could call Red Hat, and pay for a support package. They could even charge a high hourly premium for out-of-contract support calls, and offer to upgrade you into a support contract, etc.

  👤 wmf Accepted Answer ✓
They tried this back when it was called Red Hat Linux (I realize that was a very long time ago in penguin years); customers with N servers would buy one support contract and Red Hat didn't make much money. The differences between CentOS and RHEL may be small but it's literally worth billions.

BTW the RHEL Docker images are now free.

👤 kashyapc
CentOS is a community project, with Red Hat's backing. You don't go willy-nilly trample on a community. And Red Hat definitely "knows better" on dealing with open source communities more than most.

I feel a lot of it boils down to what we, as humans, know about trust: it takes aeons to build it, but you can destroy it with a single reckless action.

PS: Work for Red Hat; views expressed here are personal, of course.

👤 gtirloni
> But, if you had RHEL proper, and got into a jam - you could call Red Hat, and pay for a support package.

If you have CentOS and feel like you need paid support from Red Hat, you can convert it to RHEL.

👤 huslage
RHEL is free to download and use, you just can't get support for it unless you pay for an entitlement.