Right now, I am considering whether it would be a good idea to fully open-source the platform and backend. The only things that are currently blocking me are the fear that a competitor might use our technology without respecting licensing, and that bad actors use a zero-day breach to access customer data.
I would like to get your opinion on the idea. Would you do it? If so, what license would you choose?
*Disclosure* If you manage to find my website, I am not saying that everything is perfect now, there are definitely things I want to change, but I mainly lack time as I am the only person working on it. I am also starting pre-seed funding to build a team.
You can never take it back. Once you make it, and put it out there, what was yours is now everyone's.
I'm a FLOSS diehard, but I do not write and release much software for the express reason that I simply don't trust other people not to abuse the crap out of things. I set my end-of analysis posts much further than most (I tend to assume culpability beyond the 4th degree of seperation, where most prople abort at 1st or second for the purposes of my own analysis; impractical? Seems like, but has thusfar had a reasonably high success rate at helping me be able to sleep at night)
Note: I know ot seems contradictory, but it's one of the reasons I admire people like Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, and the FSF/EFF as much as I do. The courage and conviction they demonstrate in my opinion truly makes them remarkable people.
> The only things that are currently blocking me are the fear that a competitor might use our technology without respecting licensing.
IDK if you are talking about licensing the content or code, but open source does not necessarily mean open licensing. Unlike others, I think open but proprietary code is perfectly fine and less risky that most fear. And if someone else illegally uses your framework in another country... who cares? There are a gazillion other frameworks they could have used anyway.
Anyway, in the context of generative AI, being open source would be much more important, as contributors would be highly motivated to fix and extend your generative backend, and that constant attention is critical for keeping up with the crazy development pace.
why not reuse something like peertube and make an instance on it. You could then divert your attention into making it pay-for-play (ha ha) or whatever you like and you get the benefit of the entire peertube community.
I know the feeling of doing everything from scratch but why waste resources when you can use them elsewhere?
That said, if you have already invested a lot of time/energy/money into the project, good luck to you.
Look at Agpl license. It is a pretty nice.
>The only things that are currently blocking me are the fear that a competitor might use our technology without respecting licensing, and that bad actors use a zero-day breach to access customer data.
if these are your only concerns then how about SSPL? no for profit company will touch your codebase because it is extremly viral meaning if they use your software, they would have to open source EVERYTHING ELSE ALSO.
If you don't want to go that far, Agpl is pretty nice as i said. Companies like google dont even allow it in their internal use because they would have to open source any changes.
Here is the thing, why do you want to open source the codebase? There is a slight but important difference between "Free software" and "open source" software so you should look that one up too to take pointers.
Since you mention you are trying to build a team, and your focus is on ethics, I'd suggest making your company into a co-op. Each team member gets 1 share of the company on hire, they lose the share on quit/fire. Profits split evenly among all members. This is how all companies should be run. Capitalism is parasitic and unethical.
Yeah, people will, that's just reality.