Snort Creator Makes Good

Anonymous Coward writes: "Robin Miller, aka Roblimo, has written a great analysis of one of the first Open Source companies to be profitable before their IPO, Sourcefire! In this 'local boy makes good', we read about Team Fortress-playing programmer Marty Roesch, who writes Snort to beat his online gaming addiction. Now Snort is one of the most successful Intrusion Detection Systems out there and Marty's start-up is going gangbusters. Robin explains how Marty's company started in his basement (like Apple's garage), got profitable, then got venture capital in a time when everyone swears there is no venture. Marty even offers jobs at Sourcefire for the Slashdot crowd, 'Linux zealots, Open Source gurus, self-starters who are self motivating so I can just turn them loose...'"

Comments

great!

[Arminius]

It's good to see people who are making a difference in the open source world and not just criticize it!

Sourcefire \.'ed

[unformed]

Not really surprised...you had to state that he's offering jobs, didn't you?

But will he remain profitable?

[jschrod]

The point is not if he is profitable, but if he will remain to be so after venture capital and the associated demands came into his company. I hope that this guy did a very thorough cost-benefit analysis before he took the money.

Venture capitalists are not in for the long run, they want to capitalize their investments in the mid term. Quite some companies went bankrupt or got in difficulties after external money and the demand for quick market grab came in and drove solid growth strategy out. Look at SuSE for an example from the Linux world.

Disclaimer: I'm owner and CEO of a (privately held, incorporated) company. We still make profits, even in this harsh market, because we didn't join the hype train, but brought solid add-on value to our customers. I wish Marty Roesch luck in choosing his business strategy...

I know at least one earlier

[T.E.D.]

ACT is a company that creates only free software. They've been around since the late 90's, and I understand they have been in the black for years, perhaps since inception. They are a privately held company, and as far as I know, have no plans to ever do an IPO. Perhaps that's why they don't get much press (although RMS likes to use them as examples in his speeches).

Re:yah, snort screws it's developers

[SomeOtherGuy]

Maybe not in up front dollars...But if any open source package gets "huge" or becomes a "killer app" then being one of the "core developers" will mean much on the old Resume. Ask Linus or some of the Apache folks.

In the medical field (and in some degrees education) it is considered a huge career boost to get "published" in a journal....Considering the amount of money a Dr. makes -- just getting a concept or research published does not make tons of cash -- but the future dollars he makes "because" he was published are very big!

P.S. -- I work for a big Fortune 500 company and Snort has been all the rage this year so far. (Last year it was Apache).....

Re:Careers?

[Hast]

If you're interested in a job why don't you just fire off a mail to them? It's not too uncommon these days (with the market a bit down) for companys to hire because they have heard of you before.

They said they wanted forward people after all, contacting them before they ask you too is rather forward. (Just don't be pushy about it, just ask them to add your CV to their pile.)

You could also do as someone said and download the source and start poking around. (And the two are not mutually exclusive, of course.)