How can open source projects get acquired by third parties?

Submitted ⁨⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Custodian6718@programming.dev⁩ to ⁨nostupidquestions@lemmy.world⁩

today i was reminded of hastebin for some reason.

for context: hastebin.com was a site hosting the open source hastebin software to temporarily store text. it was very simple: you paste your text and then you save it. it could then be shared with anyone.

few years later it got acquired by toptal and the service went to the shitters but i digress…

how can an open source project just be acquired by someone like toptal? i know there tend to be central leaders on open source projects (which can be passed onto others) and hosting services can be costly but i figured due to the nature of open source that it is harder to take over a project…

yes i know forking is an option and that people did do that but still. the project is from what ive seen quite in the gutters and i havent heard of hastebin in years tbh…

source

Comments

Sort:hotnew top

schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
What you describe isn’t software getting acquired, it’s a website getting acquired.

source
lurch@sh.itjust.works ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
if it’s tied to a domain name, that domain can be acquired.

the code that is open source stays like that, but if they get all original authors on board, they can release a new version that is not open source; basically a closed source fork.

this is because the original authors can re-release their intellectual property under different licenses as much as they want, but then it’s out there with multiple licenses and people can choose which version they want to use as long as they respect the license that comes with that version.

source
Randomgal@lemmy.ca ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
“I’ll give you this fat briefcase fo money if you transfer control of all your accounts to me”

“ok.”

Thanks how.

source
slazer2au@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Because the software is still owned by someone somewhere and someone else can make an offer to buy it.

Ownership of the software doesn’t change with licenses, they just stipulate the usage. Afaik.

source
- ryannathans@aussie.zone ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I thought each contributor owned their own contributions which in why many projects can’t change the licence terms after contributors pull requests are merged unless the contributors agree unanimously
  
  source
jerkface@lemmy.ca ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
You’re talking about a service, not an open source text like source code. A service can’t be “open source” unless it lives on a computing block chain like Etherium or something, because actual human beings have to do things on private assets.

source
unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I mean in your example it wasnt the software that was bought, but the website no? If most of the project revolves around a single site that uses the software then this is inevitable.

If nobody is willing to take over the maintenance of a fork, then thats just what happens. Its not like there is a deadline to this tho. Anyone could still just fork the codebase of a project that went to shit 10 years ago and start maintaining it again.

If people are willing to work on a project for free thats cool, but without any donations it will often be too much. To get donations you need a central, well known platform that represents the entire project. This is hard to do for a fork, because potential donators would initially have to trust complete strangers to not just abandon the project again right away.

source