

Would you opensource an application like StackOverflow? Answer: Question closed. - pyman
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1285019/can-an-application-like-stackoverflow-be-built-in-less-than-4-weeks-closed

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jacquesm
So, history doesn't repeat itself ?

Yes, you can build lots of stuff quickly. But that doesn't mean it is
production ready. The devil is always in the details.

The beginning of any project is fast, you always thing 'wow, this is going
just great, at this rate I'll be done next week'. And then it starts to slide
little by little you slow down, no matter how polished your dev environment,
that's just a matter of degree.

So, after a month has passed and you start wondering what happened to make you
slow down you start to realize that this project is probably going to be just
like all the others. Once you've implemented your days list of fixes and
features you find yourself with a longer list for the next day.

And that's before you let the unwashed masses in the front door, that's when
the fun really starts.

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ZachPruckowski
I'm not sure that an opensource version of StackOverflow would be as useful as
StackExchange. Let's ignore the re-implementation issue, and assume that an
open-source clone appears by magic tomorrow morning. You still have the
support problem.

Anyone doing this as more than a hobby needs a supported solution. The reason
to pay $xxx a month is so that you can outsource worrying about the site's
maintenance and upkeep. The cost (in man-hours) of building such a clone would
be dwarfed by the hours spent bug-fixing and performance-tuning and dealing
with hardware/software issues. If the site is ancillary to your business (if
it's your customer support site, for instance), then there's a lot of sense in
letting someone else handle the support, especially if web software isn't your
core-competency. At $1300 for a dedicated, hosted server, you're essentially
betting that it'll require more than 12 programmer-hours/week ($15.6k/year
hosted vs. $50k/year for the programmer) to maintain the open-source version
and run the hardware. And you're betting that someone at Fog Creek dedicated
to maintaining Stack Exchange is going to be better at it than whomever you
lasso into maintaining it part-time.

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babyshake
The question is closed because any questions about StackOverflow belong on the
Meta Stackoverflow site.

You can put away your tin foil hat now.

