The mySQL boys leaving Sun need not be a big deal
Summary: The JBOSS deal worked out great for everyone. I think the mySQL deal will do the same. So, too, will its founders. And so will all of us.
Michael "Monty" Widenius (right), author of the original mySQL, has left the company to launch a new start-up, Monty Program AB.
He joins former CEO Martin Mickos on the outside looking in.
This has led to much wailing and gnashing of teeth, not just here but elsewhere in the computer press.
Please excuse me if I don't join in.
For me this is a case of deja vu all over again. One of the first stories I covered here involved the acquisition of the JBOSS framework by Red Hat and the subsequent leave-taking of its founder, Marc Fleury.
As with many today I was certain this was the end of JBOSS, possibly of open source itself.
I was wrong.
Some in the old JBOSS team did leave, and pretty quickly, after Marc did. But they landed on their feet. Some went to their own start-ups, others became key men within other open source companies. JBOSS survived, too. It took time to digest, and it found new competition along the way, but the ending is not an unhappy one.
With the perspective of time I suspect things will be the same in this case. The only surprise to me is that Mickos and Widenius stayed as long as they did.
Entrepreneurs are a special breed, not built for suits and hierarchies. They can't handle people over them saying no, and they should not have to.
They're too precious as what they are. Open source needs more great entrepreneurs, and to have two with experience back in the fray is very exciting. The mySQL deal was worth $1 billion. Money won't be a problem for their next projects.
All Monty has so far is a Wiki page, where he talks about building a transactional storage engine for mySQL dubbed Maria, and a branch of the language supporting it. That's good, for him, for us, and for mySQL. A project becomes powerful as it builds an ecosystem which supports it, and no ecosystem can be contained within four corporate walls.
Besides, if Sun messes up with mySQL, remember that it's open source. The code still lives. Mickos and Witinius could then fork it and it would continue moving forward. I hope they don't have to, because working on cool new stuff is always more fun than maintaining the old stuff.
The JBOSS deal worked out great for everyone. I think the mySQL deal will do the same. So, too, will its founders. And so will all of us.
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Talkback
Sun got scammed out of $1 billion.
That's one way of looking at it.
after a decent interval that's normal business.
In open source it's treated as a form of
betrayal.
I think what Sun bought was a franchise that was
cash flow positive, showed a lot of momentum,
and got them into the database game with a
business model that was proven to work.
They still have all that. Will it be worth $1
billion at the end of the day? I don't know.
It is only betrayal in the minds of the ignorant
As long as the software remains Free ('Libre') which the license guarantees, there is no problem selling it, buying it or trading it for gumballs.
Only people ignorant on the values and principles of Free software see a problem with this.
What did Sun pay for?
No, that wasn't the subject
and whether Sun will get their money out.
I was talking about the decisions of top execs
to bail -- which is normal in acquisitions.
Well, MySQL is the best alternative to Oracle...
MySQL should be with Red Hat Linux
I use it and it is very robust.
Have you tried OpenSolaris?
RE: The mySQL boys leaving Sun need not be a big deal
You definitely ARE DRINKING too much open source kool-aid. MySQL was paid that much for its elusive user base not for its quality. Even so, Sun deserves to go under for spending in the worst way possible shareholders money. Buying MySQL AB and its flagship product - yes; paying 1 bill for it - f..., NO.
RE: The mySQL boys leaving Sun need not be a big deal
Moi?
the best database out there. It may not even be
the best open source database out there. (I
likey me some Ingres.)
well...
MySQL has been more than enough for my meager needs... I do have a MS SQL guru I tap on occasion and he says there's just as many minuses to that as any of them.
So who really knows?
You know that you can buy support for MySQL from Sun?
Not the end of open source, but...
where bullheaded belief in the open source ideology
came to an end. If Sun goes down that'll be a rether
abrupt ending.
There's no way that Sun can make ROI of $1bn,
especially not in current economic climate. And MySQL
have always had a special segment mostly made up of
die-hard freebies. It was never the best database.
Indeed it was - and still is - buggy as hell once you
start using it beyond the most simple tasks.
In the context of open source and how it will be
affected in general I believe you have to look at the
different types open source project set-ups.
You have the collaborative projects. Linux Foundation
belongs here. They are kept funded because what they
produce are essential for the donors technology
stacks. They will not be very affected since the
donors will still need the projects to maintain
momentum. They were never required to turn a profit
anyway. Although you may see a desire to stay away
from the most experimental offsprings. Depending on
the funding model (en-block or earmarked) you may see
these projects cut away fringe projects and
concentrate on the core tasks.
Then there's the non-profit organizations like
Mozilla. They operate much like businesses in that
they must secure income, funding etc. by actually
<i>selling</i> something. Mozilla sells search-
integration to Google. Those organizations may see a
harder time as their income may be dwindling, the same
as for everyone else. Some will have to lay off people
and some will go under. Same as with the rest of the
economy.
(Aside: The case of Mozilla it is interesting because
personally I think they're at a vulnerable spot.
Firefox is now by far the browser with the most
vulnerabilities and is lagging in implementation of
other security areas. Which must hurt as they always
branded themselves as the "secure" alternative. Seeing
how they also struggle to get the 3.1b out, but are
hit with delay after delay I think it goes to concerns
about code quality and -complexity. They seem to be
stretched thin)
Then there's the "true" open source for-profit
companies like Red Hat, Novell and a plethora of
hopeful startups. They may be in for a very rough
time. Typically these companies secure income by
selling "support and services", commercial (non-open
source) add-ons or even commercial licenses of the
open source product. When the rest of the economy must
cut costs they have to balance layoffs against cutting
other costs. Typically it can be quite expensive to
lay off workers and you will not see the effect
immediately. The easiest costs to cut are those that
you do not <i>really</i> need to pay. You can cancel
support contracts and instead have the people you did
not lay off run an "internal" support.
Sun with MySQL and OpenOffice is in this latter group.
Frankly I doubt that Suns hardware business can keep
the SW business afloat. Although Sun claims that their
SW business is now "profitable" that is only by not
counting required ROI of their investments. It is
merely profitable (and only just so) because you don't
count depreciation of the investments. I think Sun
will have to let OO and MySQL - and even Java - go to
some other entity.
And I think the blind belief (ideologically) in open
source have to end. It is a business model, a viable
business model for some companies, but it is not
inherently superior to closed source / commercial
software in all areas.
Hopefully ignorance would end.
Hold it!.
Free software (sometimes referred to as Open source) is not a business model.
You are right in that it is an ideology, a value system different than that of proprietary software. Free software can be commercial.
"but it is not inherently superior to closed source / commercial software in all areas."
It just needs to be superior in some: Socially better, morally better.
It can end up being technically better but that is not a main value. That will just be a result of cooperative development.
Sun letting go of OO, MySQL & Java?
But the part about [i]I think Sun will have to let OO and MySQL - and even Java - go to some other entity. [/i] because Sun clearly wants to do what Microsoft and Oracle are doing, albeit in the open source model.
I disagree...
In my humble opinion, the dedicated development team model simply is not sustainable in the long term. I think that companies that have embraced open source like Sun and to some extent IBM will have an easier time of it in the next few years of economic downturn.
Studies have shown that a significant number of IT projects fail (I don't remember the numbers but do I remember being surprised), often because a proof of concept is avoided for financial reasons. The beauty of open source is that a proof of concept can usually be accomplished with "free" software downloaded from the web and using the "free" 30 days support. Most POCs can be accomplished on a single machine running VMWare or Solaris with xVM, rendering the hardware costs minimal. If the proof of concept is successful then the project can be scaled as needed, assuming it was properly designed; if the solution does not perform as intended, it's pretty easy to find an alternate source app. and try again.
On the other hand, as many do, you can build a project plan and define your software and hardware needs, then apply for budget, and when you have purchased all the hardware and software you then start to implement. If you've made a mistake, your project can become a very expensive ... failed POC. I have seen so many customers start a project with MS SQL for example, and the initial install worked fine, but then they got successful and the db wouldn't scale, forcing a redesign of the environment and sometimes causing the project to fail after users turn a cold shoulder. On the other hand, buying the Oracle licenses for a POC is pretty expensive, CTO's may find it a tad distasteful to spend that sort of money on an unproven solution.
I've been working with a client who's corporate standard is Oracle, but they did their POC with MySQL. They now have funding and are implementing, but to save time, they've decided to stick with MySQL for version 1.0. They've done testing and found that they can scale significantly with MySQL, so much so that they are building a case to remain on MySQL based on acquisition and support costs. When you tell the CFO that you can save them $175k a year in support costs, the CTO becomes a lot more interested in what you have to say. The decision now is a political one not a financial one.
No, if I had to bet, I suspect that 20 years from now if Microsoft hasn't changed their business model or gone the open source route they are almost certainly going to end up being bought by someone; most likely IBM or HP, but perhaps even Sun. Of course, if Sun bought Microsoft they [i]would[/i] open source everything...
The above is entirely my own opinion and in no way represents the views of my employer or any of my clients. No guarantees are expressed or implied as to the accuracy of any forward looking statements.
NO NDA: Why Stallman invented Free SW
Had MySQL not been open source and the acquirer had insisted and relied on patents, trade secrets, non-disclosure agreements and non-compete agreements the founders would not be able to continue to work on the software.
The music lives on, even if the band breaks up.
Jim Callahan
Orlando, FL
Stallman quote on NDA
"With my community gone, to continue as before was impossible. Instead, I faced a stark moral choice.
The easy choice was to join the proprietary software world, signing nondisclosure agreements and promising not to help my fellow hacker. Most likely I would also be developing software that was released under nondisclosure agreements, thus adding to the pressure on other people to betray their fellows too.
I could have made money this way, and perhaps amused myself writing code. But I knew that at the end of my career, I would look back on years of building walls to divide people, and feel I had spent my life making the world a worse place.
I had already experienced being on the receiving end of a nondisclosure agreement, when someone refused to give me and the MIT AI lab the source code for the control program for our printer. (The lack of certain features in this program made use of the printer extremely frustrating.) So I could not tell myself that nondisclosure agreements were innocent. I was very angry when he refused to share with us; I could not turn around and do the same thing to everyone else."
Richard Stallman in "The GNU Project" originally published in the book ?Open Sources?
http://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html
Jim Callahan
Orlando, FL
RE: The mySQL boys leaving Sun need not be a big deal
In any case, I don't see the connection between Red Hat and your opinion of MySQL being the best/most robust...