Exploring Open Source Technology: Practical Insights into Business Models
Summary
TLDR本期播客邀请了开源技术专家Kinga,深入讨论了开源软件的概念及其与专有软件的区别。Kinga介绍了其公司Workless的开源产品,并分享了开源的商业模式,包括提供企业级支持服务、云服务和插件开发。讨论还涉及了开源许可证的类型,如AGPL和宽松许可证,以及开源软件在安全性、社区反馈和产品影响方面的潜在优势。Kinga强调了开源不仅是为了经济利益,更是为了对世界产生积极影响,提高全球生产力。
Takeaways
- 👋 开源技术讨论:本次播客邀请了Kinger作为嘉宾,讨论了开源技术及其产品Workless。
- 💡 开源定义:开源即公开应用程序背后的源代码,允许公众使用、修改和分发。
- 🛠️ 开源与专有软件的区别:开源软件允许用户访问和修改源代码,而专有软件则限制这些权限。
- 📜 开源许可证:通过不同的许可证和商业模式来管理开源项目,如AGPL和GPL等。
- 🏢 企业使用开源的优势:企业可以通过自托管产品减少SaaS模式下的成本,提高成本效益。
- 🔌 开源插件模式:通过第三方开发者创建插件来扩展平台功能,适应不同行业需求。
- 🌐 全球化影响:开源项目能够被全球数百万甚至数十亿人使用,如WordPress。
- 🔒 安全性考量:开源软件的代码可以被众多人审计和改进,提高了安全性。
- 🤝 社区协作:开源鼓励社区成员之间的协作,共同改进产品。
- 🚌 巴士因子:开源项目不依赖于单一开发者或团队,即使核心成员离开,项目仍可继续。
- 💡 创业心态:开源不仅是经济模式,也是对世界的贡献,提高全球生产力。
Q & A
什么是开源技术?
-开源技术指的是将应用程序背后的代码公开给公众,允许人们使用、修改和分发源代码。这是一种相对新颖且有些看似荒谬的想法,因为它涉及到将私有产品或服务的代码开放给外界。
开源软件与专有软件的主要区别是什么?
-开源软件允许用户访问、修改和分发源代码,而专有软件则不允许这些操作,通常需要购买许可证或订阅服务来使用。
开源软件的商业模式有哪些?
-开源软件可以通过多种方式实现商业化,例如通过提供支持服务、云解决方案、插件开发等。企业可以选择自托管产品或使用开源软件供应商提供的云服务。
为什么有些企业会选择将他们的产品开源?
-企业可能出于多种原因选择开源他们的产品,比如增加产品的可见性和影响力、吸引社区贡献、降低开发成本、提高产品质量和安全性等。
开源软件的许可证有哪些类型,它们之间有什么区别?
-开源许可证有多种类型,如GPL、MIT、Apache等。其中,Copyleft许可证(如GPL)要求任何基于该代码的衍生作品也必须开源,而宽松许可证(如MIT、Apache)则没有这样的要求。
开源软件在安全性方面有哪些优势?
-由于开源软件的代码可以被成千上万的人审计和改进,因此在某些情况下,它可能比专有软件更安全。社区的广泛参与有助于快速发现和修复安全漏洞。
企业在选择开源解决方案时应该考虑哪些因素?
-企业在选择开源解决方案时,应该考虑许可证的兼容性、社区的活跃度、产品的稳定性和成熟度、以及是否能够满足企业特定的业务需求。
为什么有些开发者或企业对开源持有保留态度?
-一些开发者或企业可能担心开源会削弱他们对其创造物的控制权,或者担心无法从开源产品中获得足够的经济回报。
开源产品如何确保其可持续发展?
-开源产品可以通过提供专业服务、云服务、接受捐赠、以及开发增值插件等方式来确保可持续发展。
开源软件的'bus factor'是什么?
-“bus factor”是指如果项目的关键贡献者(比如核心开发者)遭遇不测(比如被'bus'撞了),项目能否继续维持和发展的能力。开源项目由于社区的广泛参与,通常具有较高的'bus factor'。
如何理解开源对于产品创新和社区发展的贡献?
-开源鼓励知识共享和技术协作,可以吸引全球的开发者和用户参与到产品的创新过程中来。这不仅能够加速产品的发展,还能够促进技术社区的成长和多元化。
Outlines
😀 开源技术介绍与Workless产品概述
本段落介绍了嘉宾Kinga作为企业家和学者的背景,以及她在斯里兰卡经营技术公司的经历。Kinga讨论了开源技术的概念,即公开应用程序背后的源代码,并解释了开源与专有软件的区别。她提到了开源社区中存在的多种许可证和商业模式,以及她的公司如何通过开源产品Workless与社区互动。
💡 开源软件的经济模型与企业优势
Kinga探讨了开源软件的经济模型,包括软件即服务(SaaS)模式和自托管产品的优势。她解释了Workless的商业模式,包括提供企业级客户支持、云服务和插件开发。Kinga强调了开源软件在成本效益、社区贡献和产品改进方面的潜在优势,以及如何通过这些方式为世界提供价值。
🔑 开源许可证的类型与选择
本段讨论了开源许可证的两种主要类型:Copyleft许可证和Permissive许可证。Kinga解释了两者之间的区别,即Copyleft要求修改后的代码也必须开源,而Permissive许可证则没有这一要求。她提到Workless选择了AGPL作为其开源许可证,并讨论了这种选择对公司SaaS模式和云解决方案的影响。
🛡️ 开源软件的安全性讨论
Kinga讨论了开源软件在安全性方面的优势,指出由于源代码可以被广泛审计,因此可能比专有软件更安全。她提到了开源项目如WordPress的普及,以及它们如何通过社区的广泛使用和反馈来提高安全性。此外,她还提到了开源软件在提供产品持续性和减少对单一供应商依赖方面的好处。
🤔 开源与知识产权的心理与哲学考量
Kinga分享了她对于开源与知识产权的看法,强调了创造产品以服务更广泛用户群体的重要性。她讨论了开源如何促进产品反馈和分发,并提供了产品持续性的保证。Kinga认为,尽管开源可能意味着放弃某些知识产权,但这有助于为世界提供更好的产品和服务,从而产生更大的影响。
🙌 结束语与对未来讨论的期待
在视频脚本的最后,主持人感谢Kinga参与讨论并分享了关于开源的见解。他们期待基于观众的反馈继续深入讨论,并探索如何通过开源解决实际问题,推动斯里兰卡的商业和社区发展。
Mindmap
Keywords
💡开源
💡专有软件
💡许可证
💡商业模式
💡SaaS(软件即服务)
💡自托管
💡插件
💡安全性
💡社区
💡知识产权
💡产品
Highlights
开源技术讨论,Kinger作为嘉宾分享对开源的理解及其产品Workless的介绍。
Kinger介绍了自己作为企业家和学者的双重身份,以及在斯里兰卡乡村经营技术公司12年的经历。
解释了开源软件的概念,即公开应用程序背后的源代码供公众使用、修改和分发。
讨论了开源与专有软件的不同,以及开源社区通过不同许可证和商业模式进行管理的方式。
Kinger分享了将产品Workless开源的动机,包括提供服务、云解决方案和插件扩展。
探讨了开源软件的经济模型,特别是对于企业级客户如何通过开源解决方案降低成本。
介绍了开源许可的两种类型:Copyleft许可证和Permissive许可证,以及它们之间的基本区别。
讨论了开源软件在安全性方面的优势,如代码审计和社区贡献改善安全措施。
Kinger强调了开源不仅是为了经济利益,更是为了对世界产生积极影响和提供好的产品。
提到了开源产品可以避免“巴士因子”问题,即关键开发者离开后项目依然可以持续运行。
讨论了企业在选择开源解决方案时应考虑的许可证问题和对原始供应商的双重许可可能性。
Kinger分享了Workless选择AGPL许可证的原因,以及它如何适合公司的SaaS和自托管版本。
强调了开源对于提高全球生产力的重要性,以及Workless在政府机构中的潜在应用。
讨论了开源对于个人和企业的心理影响,以及放弃专有权利以获得更广泛反馈和分布的决策。
Kinger表达了对于开源的深刻理解,认为它是提供给世界好东西的一种方式,而不仅仅是为了金钱。
讨论了如何通过开源产品吸引全球数百万用户的反馈,以提高产品的安全性和质量。
最后,Kinger对参与讨论表示感谢,并期待未来有更多的交流和讨论。
Transcripts
[Music]
hello and welcome to our PE
talk today we have a special guest to
speak about open source
technology K is here and I warmly
welcome Kinga a good friend of mine to
speak about and discuss
about uh what is open
source and I thought you are the right
person to speak since you already have
your own open source
product it is
workless so before starting whole
discussion caring
can you give a introduction about
yourselves that our audience will get to
know about you hi thank you lushka for
having me for your um great uh
podcast um so my name is kinger and I'm
um I'm sort of an entrepreneur as well
as an academic um I teach at the
University plus I I build products and
um we are running a company a tech
company in rural Sri Lanka probably 200
kilometers away from the capital for the
last 12 years so we build products we
build games and we do some uh little bit
of a Services as well so that's pretty
much about me and um
yeah and King starting with your
workland
product uh you got I mean you said that
it's open source right can you tell us
what is open source uh mean and you know
for people who like what made you think
uh differentiating I would say uh
differentiating from propr you know
proprietary software to uh open
source right so open source in the sense
as it sounds it's basically you know
revealing the code that uh behind the uh
application into the public so it it's
uh you know it's kind of a new new thing
and kind of a ridiculous idea as well
like you know if you if you build kind
of an open open you know if you build
kind of a proprietary product why we
need to make it open right so um so to
your qu question the answer is like you
know we are simply opening the code
behind the application to the public so
that's uh basically open source so um in
in the open source World there are
number of ways to govern govern this
thing which
is you know through various licenses and
various business models are there so uh
it's an interesting you know Valley to
experience right so the open source valy
so um so that's uh basically what open
source
is calling to deep into the right to use
modify and distribution which is
something um a proprietary for example
if if I built if I'm a software
developer I built something which is is
my creation which is my proprietary
right so whereas in open source
Community like you know once you give it
to the
community whoever who receives is able
to use that source code which is the the
software which is the coding behind that
product service a product particularly
and also to modify it and also to use
and you know you know benefit the the
developer and redistribute as well so I
think the audience would love to you
know hear from you particularly when you
decide that look my proprietary which is
my own Creations I'm giving it to uh to
the open source community so that what
is your economic model what's what is
your gain on giving up your propriety
rights right so this is you know this is
a very nice time to make products open
source right so you know early days um
uh we had you know still we have things
like SAS soft as a service service model
which is like you know you are you know
you basically renting the
technology uh for your work for an
example if you're paying per user per
month pricing you're basically renting
their product and uh building your
infrastructure or your data set on top
of their
platform
right it's it's fine it's fine but the
problem is let's say if if it's a large
large
corporation so the cost of SAS billing
will exponentially go high and uh
because of you know because of the users
and because of the pricing right but
Enterprises can't reduce the cost if
they have like you know expon
exponentially growing cost of SAS
billing right so that then uh the the
other other workaround is to get
selfhosted
products uh into their companies and uh
run their run the things from their own
um but the but the uh when it comes com
to the business model of the open source
that we have at work lens there are one
primary way is to release the product
into you know their own tenants our
users tenants or their own servers as a
self husted or we can call it as on
premise
Solutions um uh to their need so that's
you know then we we can give you know
the support and we can give them the you
know the different level of service uh
level
agreements uh for for the benefit of
their uh work but when it comes to you
know um when it comes to the the the
other other model that we can have is
like you know if if anybody can't you
know host it on their own we can use
they can use our Cloud solution as well
and the other thing is the other
economic model that what we are thinking
is to create plugins which is actually
extending the existing platform into
numerous Industries uh uh by third party
developers like probably the
Integrations probably the security
features they can be it can be a plug-in
and we can extend the platform on top of
it so which is actually kind of nice
thing because you know since we are
living in Sri Lanka so we we need to
understand our strengths weaknesses and
opportunities also the threat
so as as developers as
Engineers as innovators so if you want
to offer good things to the world I
think open source is one of
the best way that we can offer good
things to the world right so it's
actually opening the P opening our code
Opening Our Innovations to the public
and lot of lot of talented Engineers a
lot of talented coders thinkers can
collaborate with us to build better
products so which is kind of a nice
thing right so um that's what we are
currently just to just to summarize what
you said you said that in your economic
model because you see you are a software
development company and and the reason
you wanted to make it open source is
that uh you can provide certain services
for Enterprise level customers on
premises and second would be the cloud
services that you can offer to them
right third would be to provide plugins
right so those are the main reasons that
or the economic model that you basically
built in this open source um sort of
environment right yes so moving to that
now it's it's you as a as a developer or
a software development company or
software service company that gets so if
you consider the Enterprise level right
so you you were earlier address issue
the reduce you know they can reduce
substantial cost element from that right
and other than the cost element what
what should on Enterprise devel company
should look for to obtain open-source uh
Solutions and um can you give a certain
insightful U thought of that looking at
the uh for the Enterprises they can you
know they can think of the the you know
you know the licenses right uh probably
open source licenses might you know
little bit tricky actually but you know
for Enterprises we you know they might
need to have uh uh might need to have
kind of an understanding about the
licenses plus you know if the original
vendor can dual license it um for the
specific uh Enterprises that might be
the best way so uh then they can have
the best of both worlds meaning like you
know the a lot of people are improving
the product at the same time uh from the
community while they will while the
companies can get the benefit uh from uh
the open source code into the co
Enterprises with a different license
which is kind of a good thing right so
these things like we can that that's
probably the way the way so also like
bringing the the topic of Licensing so I
would like to uh you know explain if you
can right briefly explain about
two license basically the copy left
license of of Open Source and also the
permissive license
so what's basic difference between those
I know there are different types of
Licensing also but those two are mainly
uh is commonly used license categories
right
yeah yes yes you're correct so open
source license are little bit tricky as
I said early so it's it's a quite a big
Spectrum which is having one end is
actually the copy left licensing meaning
you know whatever the things that you do
or whatever the things that you modify
you need to release to the public right
the other thing is the permissive end
which is the you know um you know you
can modify the code you can use it for
you know commercial or any any use but
you don't need to re release the code
both of these have both of these ends
have their own pros and cons so at work
lens we selected agpl F GPL license
which is
actually uh we think it's good for for
us uh because we are running our own SAS
model as well a Cloud solution plus self
hosted versions but for you know let's
say if it's a
developer uh licenses let's say you know
if you're are integrating with the
developer products or internal
products might be agpl might not be the
best way so they can go for the
permissive licenses so that's uh that's
basically the the two ends of this
licensing right so um so it
depends no for for audience uh so you
you you basically your workpl product
comes under the category of uh AGP right
afro general public license there's a
copy left license in return what you get
is uh the community should provide the
uh amendments or the modifications that
happens to your source code so that it
builds and it
validates right
uh right so um and also moving uh to the
another area of discussion is how about
the context of security in terms of
using open source softwares a security
TR or how how do you think the
organization should you know consider on
that aspect so security threat is
actually you know rather than going for
the proprietary product it might be the
best way to go with open source to a
certain extent because the code can be
audited by thousands of people and these
guys can you know improve the security
measures inside of the product so rather
than going for the proprietary product
but I'm not saying it's like 100%
correct argument but it's having its own
pros and cons but um to a certain extent
I don't think security measures security
problems will be uh the decision factor
for going for the open source because a
lot of there are a lot of good open
source projects out there like you using
by millions of billions of people one of
the very good example is the WordPress
so WordPress is a 100% open source
product so I think more than 40% of the
world web is on um on on WordPress I I
probably my number is wrong but majority
of the worldwide web is actually on
WordPress which is you know that's the
power of the open source the
distribution is a key so um so we can
distribute this product into a lot of
people millions of people so you know
rather than going for 100 people it's
going for Millions millions of people so
that's Millions million feedback rather
than 100 feedback so if if you want to
have the security measures that's not
100 security measures that's millions of
security measures right millions of use
cases how to improve our security inside
of the product which is a really good
thing
right right calling another thing that I
want to discuss particularly with regard
to it development and this is like an
attitude towards many of the
organization which is this is my
creation the concept of the proprietary
nature which is uh to say that why would
I give the
freedom of of modification using and uh
the context which
I
created now just to address because
since you're entrepreneur I want to ask
you sort of the not the economic aspect
but also the this the sense of uh you
looking into the
problem how you define this intellectual
property context in open source now you
wanted to build something and I make it
public and still I won't R my ownership
like something like you know creation of
intellectual property but also getting
the feedback that as you said security
would be increased lot of validation
validation can be done through Open
Source Products what my question is like
the psychological aspect of it you know
people want to retain their honesty they
wanted to keep their intellectual
property they don't want to compete and
those are like the the
basic you
know business sentiments so how would
you think that would uh you as
entrepreneur since you have see it
what's your insightful thought on that
you know
when it comes to this kind of aspects
right we need to
understand why we are building products
right so the products needs to is it for
hundreds or is it for millions or is it
for billions right we will products not
for thousands but for Millions right to
go for Millions we need to find a
strategic way to do that right so there
are compromises on that that is totally
fine if they are not paying for us for
open source code that is totally fine
but feedback is much more important
distribution is much more important
plus we are giving good things to the
world right so before we are dying we
are offering good things right even now
like you know there's a thing called bus
Factor what will happen if you are hit
by a bus right what will happen to the
people who are using the product right
but now the users can't you know they
don't want to worry because if if we are
we hitting we all hit by a bus then um
the the other day they can use our open
source code and run it run the product
from from their own so that's kind of a
security and Assurance will come
automatically for an open source product
right so you
know open sourcing is not you know we
are not 100% focused on the money like
you know that's a different story we
need money that's uh but know it's not
the first the first is to make an impact
into the teams the productive
organizations and making productive
organizations in the world so that's our
you know let's say you know the work
lens can be a product that we can use in
the government right we actually
speaking with couple of government
institutions at the moment right
they they will definitely use it
if if they are increasing their
productivity as a country as a world we
are imp improving our productivity as a
whole if you are not open sourcing they
we cannot do that right so that's one of
the benefits that we are now looking at
right it's not the money it's something
else um yeah I hope you can get got my
the answer compl I
completely taken your point and uh
um basically thanking King for joining
with us today and providing us
insightful uh thoughts about open source
and how it affects
basically you know the economic model
one should
consider and we we we wanted to make
this discussion and to continue this
discussion so that based on the comments
that we have we will improve our our P
stop discussion so what we want is to
see the
insightful ideas and to how to see to to
grow Sri Lankan
business and also it Community to see
how how exactly we can solve problems
and this initiative is basically for
that purpose so I'm again thanking
kinger for joining us with us today and
we will uh see again is anything uh else
that calling you wanted to add to the
audience or discussion congratulations
your uh on your first uh
podcast yes okay and
uh then um see we'll meet again with
another discussion like this thank you
all very much thank you thank you
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