On Fri, Dec 12, 2014 at 12:19 PM, mmarco <mma...@unizar.es> wrote: > My impression is that open sourcing SMC wouldn't have a big impact on the > business oportunity. > > The main niche of clients would be universities that want to move their math > courses to the cloud. For them, having the source code mean that it would be > possible to set up their own server, but they still would need to buy > hardware, set it up and maintain it, and hire personel with the expertise to > administer it. That is a big investment just to start, i guess that you > (having already the expertise and some hardware to start with) could offer > prices that beat that option, specially in the short term.
It's not so simple. When SMC was closed source, UW would do the work involving taking payments, legal stuff, and allow me to use the hardware/people/resource that UW has. Since SMC is now open source, they won't allow any of that in a business context. (This was part of the reason SMC was closed source.) This means that commercialization of SMC can't happen until several relatively expensive things along the lines of "they still would need to buy hardware, set it up and maintain it, and hire personnel with the expertise to administer it" happen, which must get paid for by private money. The expenses are way more than an order of magnitude more than I personally have available. Exactly what prevents the competitor you are imagining is also an obstruction to commercialization of SMC now. It's even a little scarier right now, because much of SMC is running on Google Compute Engine, and those free credits are rapidly running out (commercialization was going to take care of that). There is enough hardware at UW to keep things running, though I also pay over $7K/year just for physical rack space for hosting that hardware at UW. But don't worry -- there is a potential private investor, and I think things will work out very well. > The possible risk is that somebody could start a company to offer the same > service, but again you have the starting advantage. > > About this... what about AGPL? Would that be possible? I can't make any license changes in the shortterm, though eventually it may be possible. AGPL would mean that if somebody else makes an SMC competitor they would have to share any modifications they make to the backend code. That would be reassuring. -- William > > > El viernes, 12 de diciembre de 2014 19:33:10 UTC+1, William escribió: >> >> On Fri, Dec 12, 2014 at 10:28 AM, maldun <dom...@gmx.net> wrote: >> > Hi! >> > >> > On Thursday, December 11, 2014 10:47:20 PM UTC+1, William wrote: >> >> >> >> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 1:28 PM, maldun <dom...@gmx.net> wrote: >> >> > That's great to hear! >> >> > >> >> > Although I don't know If GPL3 is the best choice ... >> >> >> >> I actually didn't have an option regarding GPL or not. >> >> >> > Not even LGPL or at least GPL2? >> >> I may have an option regarding GPL2 versus GPL3. >> >> >> >> > Just some ideas that would come to my mind: >> > >> > The software is open, but hosting doesn't have to be >> > >> > Premium accounts with extras >> > More available processing power for money >> > One idea could be mimiing Github: All worksheets are open, except you >> > pay >> > some bucks/month >> > Goodies (e.g. alternative skins for the interface) >> > >> > Apps for smartphones: The flashcard app Anki does this. Although it is >> > OS >> > they charge money for smartphone interfaces >> > GPL does not forbid adding commercial extra packages, as long they are >> > standalone enough. >> > The classic: Advertisment >> >> Thanks for all of your ideas! >> >> William >> >> > >> > - Stefan >> > >> >> >> >> > >> >> > On Thursday, December 11, 2014 6:47:05 PM UTC+1, William wrote: >> >> >> >> >> >> Hi, >> >> >> >> >> >> SageMathCloud is now completely open source. The complete source >> >> >> code is here, so if you've ever wondered how something in SMC works, >> >> >> you can now find out... >> >> >> >> >> >> https://github.com/sagemath/cloud >> >> >> >> >> >> There is also a new developer mailing list: >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!forum/sage-cloud-devel >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> Question: Why is SMC open source? >> >> >> >> >> >> Answer: Two of the four NSF grants that very substantially supported >> >> >> SMC development had explicit open source requirements. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> -- William >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> -- >> >> >> William Stein >> >> >> Professor of Mathematics >> >> >> University of Washington >> >> >> http://wstein.org >> >> > >> >> > -- >> >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> >> > Groups >> >> > "sage-devel" group. >> >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, >> >> > send >> >> > an >> >> > email to sage-devel+...@googlegroups.com. >> >> > To post to this group, send email to sage-...@googlegroups.com. >> >> > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel. >> >> > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> -- >> >> William Stein >> >> Professor of Mathematics >> >> University of Washington >> >> http://wstein.org >> > >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> > Groups >> > "sage-devel" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >> > an >> > email to sage-devel+...@googlegroups.com. >> > To post to this group, send email to sage-...@googlegroups.com. >> > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel. >> > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> >> >> >> -- >> William Stein >> Professor of Mathematics >> University of Washington >> http://wstein.org > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "sage-devel" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to sage-devel+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- William Stein Professor of Mathematics University of Washington http://wstein.org -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "sage-devel" group. 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