Show HN: Updating the TimescaleDB license thanks to HN
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23272992
Many commented on the Timescale License, our source-available license governing advanced features (eg multi-node). Most were positive, but some pointed out drawbacks (who says HN can't be productive!). That spurred an internal debate.
Today we're happy to share an updated Timescale License with new rights, including the "right-to-repair" and "right-to-improve." And we’re doubling-down on our community, making all enterprise features free:
https://blog.timescale.com/blog/building-open-source-business-in-cloud-era-v2
The open-source business model used to be simple. Companies run your software, some pay you for support. But today companies would rather pay someone to operate software, eliminating the need to buy support. The Cloud has cut off the primary business model for open-source software.
Enter new licenses like the Timescale, Elastic, and Confluent Community Licenses. These "Cloud Protection Licenses" licenses maintain an open-source spirit, but protect the right of delivering software in the cloud for the project’s main creator.
Why not just “compete with the best cloud product”? Public clouds (Amazon, Microsoft, Google) are trillion dollar corporations, with market position, pricing power, deep pockets, and (possibly) unfair business practices. Enterprises get locked into discounted multi-year agreements; startups get $100,000s of free credits.
Yet even with 100,000s employees and billions of dollars, they did not develop TimescaleDB, Elastic, Confluent, and others.
Open-source companies represent a large amount of innovation in our industry. We are scrappy, entrepreneurial teams taking on not 1, but 3 software empires. Cloud Protection Licenses enable the open-source Davids to compete against the public cloud Goliaths.
So thank you again to the HN community!