How Your Company Can Benefit from Contributing to Open Source

It’s Open Source Week at SitePoint! All week we’re publishing articles focused on everything Open Source, Free Software and Community, so keep checking the OSW tag for the latest updates.

Open source is the antithesis of proprietary software. It’s the free lovin’ hippie amid a sea of corporate profiteers. Defined as software for which the source code is freely available to view, modify, and redistribute, open source software has benefited hardened coders and layman consumers alike. But just because it’s free doesn’t mean profit-driven companies can’t use open source to their advantage.

Here are five ways your company can benefit from contributing to open source.

1. Free Help from the Community

While you’ll certainly need programmers to build the initial software, once the code is made public, you can rely on the wisdom of the crowd for debugging and improvements. The open source community — many of whom can be found at GitHub — is massive, far-reaching, and perhaps most importantly, active.

They are programmers committed to their craft, and strive to see new software reach its full potential. So if your company releases a promising piece of open source software, you may not need to hire programmers for future improvements. The more attention it gets, the more you’ll start seeing free contributions. And if things really take off, the inertia you’ll gain may surpass that of any in-house effort.

2. Free Publicity

If your company makes a piece of software freely available to the public, chances are more users are going to see it, use it, and share it. Now, the software has to be good, or at least adequate, to gain any real traction, but if it is, awareness will spread and your brand name will benefit.

More eyes on your open source software means more eyes on your company, and if people like the software, they’ll (hopefully) associate your brand with value, customer appreciation, gratification, and goodwill initiatives.

3. Supporting Act

Say your company sells server hardware. That, of course, is where you’ll make the bulk of your money, but what if you decide to create an open source operating system along with it? Now, potential buyers won’t have to spend money on an operating system of their own, which frees them up to spend more money on server hardware.

This is how your open source software can support your core product. It not only lures in customers, but by allowing them to save money on one thing, they’re able, and encouraged, to spend money on another.

Continue reading %How Your Company Can Benefit from Contributing to Open Source%

by Joshua Kraus via SitePoint