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Developers Lose With Proprietary Software

Posted by michael on from the wah-wah-wah-waaaaaaaaaaah dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Appgen looked like a nice cross-platform accounting program independent software developers could use as a base for custom applications, and lots of them paid $2000 or more for the company's development kits. Then Appgen went out of business and left all those developers stranded. They can't even generate license keys, and their support has disappeared. Nobody knows who now owns Appgen's code, so it looks like all those developers and their clients are screwed. This couldn't happen if Appgen was Open Source. There's a strong lesson in this story for those who choose to listen." Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.

4 of 394 comments (clear)

  1. Source code escrow by sphealey · · Score: 5, Insightful
    This couldn't happen if Appgen was Open Source. There's a strong lesson in this story for those who choose to listen.
    Yes, the lesson is: don't buy a propriatary app without a 3rd party source-code escrow agreement. That was figured out around 1965.

    sPh

  2. From a Real World Experience... by Black-Man · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We gave our source to our paying customers when we decided to drop the product and switch directions.

    Everyone seemed pleased with the arrangement, even though I doubt they were pleased when they got the gazillion lines of C++ code without support.

    And to think my idea of going open source was ridiculed by management 6 months before we flamed out.

    Sheesh...

  3. Re:Sounds familiar by Randolpho · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Er.... the Java programming language is a specification, and an open one at that (IIRC). If Sun went under, IBM still has a kick-ass VM and SDK. And a great IDE in Eclipse, too. If Sun went under, Java would continue unabated; it's a programming language, not a library or modifiable application.

    From the article it seems to me that Appgen (which I'm not familiar with) is either an IDE/Library/ProprietaryLanguage, or a full-blown application that developers can modify for their own use. It's a far cry from Java.

    --
    "Times have not become more violent. They have just become more televised."
    -Marilyn Manson
  4. Escrow and bankruptcy by ProfDumb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yes, the lesson is: don't buy a propriatary app without a 3rd party source-code escrow agreement. That was figured out around 1965.

    So, you have a contract that specifies software escrow. And when the company goes bankrupt and you find the source is not in escrow (or not all of the source is in escrow, or there is third-party IP in the escrowed source, or ...):

    who are you going to sue?

    An escrow agreement is likely to be enforceable right up until the moment you need it.

    The difference with open source is that you have the source in hand now and so if the company disappears you don't have to sue a non-existant entity to get the code.