Why not go open source?

I’ve been writing this week about questions to ask yourself if you have a closed source company and are thinking about moving to an open source strategy. Today, I want to address the question of ‘why not?’

Point 3: There are real risks / downsides to an open source strategy

Unlike some people in the space, I don’t think an open source approach is right for every single company or that open source is a risk-free approach. I do think it can be the right approach for a lot of companies, but if you’re going to embrace an open source approach you should be aware of, and know how you’ll mitigate, the risks.

And what are those risks?

• The first risk is lack of focus. If you’re signing up to follow in open source approach, this means you’ll have two different products, each with a different product roadmap, different marketing/evangelism needs, different target market. You can’t let yourself get pulled too far in the community side, or you’ll lose your focus on revenue, but if you want the advantages of open source you can’t ignore the community, either.

• IP risk. Obviously, you might be worried competitors will rip you off, or you’ll lose your moat. Or AWS will fork your project and make a competing product available in one click to anyone on AWS.

• Revenue risk, that customers / prospects will be so happy with the open source that they won’t want to pay you anymore.

Can a good open source strategy overcome these risks? Sure. But you should be aware of the risks, understand which ones worry you the most, and have a plan for making sure they don’t threaten the ROI you hope to get from your open source strategy.