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Can You Be Denied the Right To Support OSS?
jerico.dev writes "I am currently selecting a CM tool for a project. Important condition: the software must be OSI compliant. I considered Alfresco, since they call themselves 'open source.' Then I heard from several of Alfresco's partners that they are not allowed to do projects based on Alfresco's GPL edition because their partnership contract denied them the right to do so. They only can support Alfresco's enterprise edition. But Alfresco's VP of business development Matt Asay told me that their enterprise edition is not OSI compliant. Does anyone in the Slashdot crowd have experience with partner contracts of other OSS vendors? Is it normal that Sun, Red Hat, etc. force their partners to decline projects based on their open source editions? It's probably legal to do so, but do you think it is legitimate and fair?"
To answer another question of yours...
Sun has open sourced just about everything they have right now including Cluster and SAMFS. They just charge for support using the old pricing model. You can use it, but if you have a question or a problem then you need to pay.
It's a fair trade. Open Source is not free of charge. Cluster and SAMFS are damn complex software and you had better not go it alone unless you really know your stuff. And experts always pay for backline help.
Sun's goal is to get lots of people interested in using their good code (a lot of it really is great). If you use it for your own purposes and go it alone, fine. But when you have a paying customer requiring enterprise support...you'll use the code you know and funnel the support dollars back. None of our clients would ever consider not paying.
This is not evil. If you ask me, it's fair trade and probably the only model that will keep OSS going into the enterprise.
My advice: you get what you pay for. Don't get fooled by the GPL tag...people gotta pay the bills.
Notice where the OP makes exactly this distinction in the last setntence?
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!