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0 pointswilliamstein9y ago0 comments

Sell support contracts. Kind of similar to MongoDB's strategy, but they were too late to the party. Also the "support" open source business model doesn't always scale well and works better when the product quality and documentation isn't so first rate (like Rethinkdb's is).

0 comments

d239y ago

I've always found that to be a perverse incentive model. I don't know how to do any better though. Maybe shaming companies that use OS projects heavily into donating? Not really sure how to scale that either.

sratner9y ago

I currently pay someone else to host a rethinkdb cluster. I'd rather pay rethinkdb.com to do that, but they didn't offer.

I am sure they considered it and figured it wasn't a good model for them. It is unfortunate that I have (with much pleasure) used rethinkdb in several projects, yet haven't had a chance to pay them for a service that would be useful to me.

pluma9y ago

As I understand it, running a SaaS business is a huge undertaking in itself, so doing that while maintaining an open source database can be daunting and -- like any business -- risky.

dkersten9y ago

I've actually wondered about this too. I would happily pay rethinkdb.com for hosted rethinkdb :-(

scandox9y ago

It can be highly perverse. I took over a project that had used the open source CMS Composite C1 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composite_C1).

As far as I can tell the codebase is designed to be as opaque and complex as possible. Any normal organisation will pony up the fees (between $1000 and $5000 per annum - https://cms.orckestra.com/Products/Plans) rather than try to really get their head around it.

raarts9y ago

Actually I think they were too early in the market. Everything is moving towards real-time updates but we're at the beginning of that curve yet.

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