

Ask HN: Would you build a startup from open source? - adrianwaj

People build sites and businesses around third-party APIs and often this is discouraged, so alternatively, what open source applications and codebases appeal to you as the basis for a startup, perhaps as a fork? Are there code licenses you seek out or avoid?<p>Are there any successful open source based startups that have inspired you?
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viscanti
The vast majority of (web) startups leverage open source technology. Most use
both an open source database as well as programming language(s). Beyond that,
many use an open source framework on top of their language of choice.

Building around someone else's APIs isn't such a cardinal sin as you're
implying. The big questions is what are you building? Owning and controlling
your full stack is important if you're building something huge, but you can
build something profitable leveraging someone else's APIs. There's a bias here
towards building BIG businesses rather than lifestyle businesses, so advice
about avoiding third-party APIs would come from that. If it works for the
project you're doing, then do it. If not, then don't.

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buro9
Avoid Affero GPL.

Consider avoiding GPL if you are going to make modifications, want to
redistribute your work, and cannot support a process for releasing that work.

Nearly all permissives licenses are good (Apache, MIT, most BSD, etc).

Nearly all licenses allow you to make modifications, it's just a question of
whether you are re-distributing the work covered by the original license or
not. That's when things get interesting and you should check the licenses
carefully in advanced.

But if you have no plans to redistribute then nearly all permissive licenses
are good.

BTW: This is a 30-second rule I use... it's not fact, IANAL.

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benwerd
I co-founded an open source startup six years ago (based on a project that I
also co-founded), and probably have a book or two in me on the subject.

In short, building around a third-party open source project is probably an
easier win than building around a project that you founded and maintain.
(Forking, on the other hand, is not something I'd recommend.) While not
required, it's a really good idea to make friends with the community
organizers and, ideally, find some way to contribute both code and funds
upstream when you become successful - after all, your business is based on
their continued existence.

That said, although it's certainly much harder to succeed under these terms,
maintaining your own project is a valuable, rewarding experience, and gives
you significantly more control over its direction.

Just remember that open source code has an accounting value of 0 - so any open
source IP you create is not capturing value in the company, and unless you're
careful, one-to-one professional services don't either. You'll have to figure
out how to make your company valuable with valueless code another way. (Hosted
services are a good example.)

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mkup
_Are there code licenses you seek out or avoid?_

Avoid Affero GPL (AGPL). Everything else is fine for commercial (closed close)
startup based on open source software.

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PaulHoule
How about RHT?

[http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=RHT+Interactive#chart1:sy...](http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=RHT+Interactive#chart1:symbol=rht;range=5y;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined)

That's about as good a 5 year chart as you'll see in today's stock market.
They represent one particular business model, and they've done exceptionally
well, but they're just one example of a company that's taken open source all
the way to the bank.

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noeltock
We've built our business (a sort of carbonmade for restaurants) on top of
WordPress ( <http://www.theme-force.com> ). It's been a very gratifying
experience so far, as we're able to develop and deploy various features &
functionality very quickly. Definitely makes sense to find open source
resources where you're not reinventing the wheel, have good momentum and make
sense for your idea.

