Why did Adobe open source Magento?

leraje , 5 months ago

Magento was open source before Adobe bought it, Flash wasn’t.

TigrisMorte , 5 months ago

"Why do Corpos allow People to work for free to improve their product?" - OP, evidently.

Vub , 5 months ago

They didn’t, the community edition existed before Adobes purchase.

labbbb OP , 5 months ago

Okay, but why then do they continue to support Magento (Community Edition) as open source?

bugsmith , 5 months ago

The same reason a lot of companies support a community edition. It means that people can use, learn and become experienced with the product without forking over a tonne of money.

This results in a larger number of developers, add-ons and community surrounding the product.

This makes it a more appealing product for companies looking to build a business using it.

It’s the same reason you can use AWS for free, get some JetBrains products for free and often find community editions for similar products to Magento.

deweydecibel , 5 months ago

It also prevents competition.

Locking down Magneto would have resulted in a fork that could grow to rival the product Adobe now owns. With a community edition, the community has less incentive to fork. You can still use the product, and surely that will never ever change, so why bother getting to work on a competing fork?

Then years down the line, when no competition has come to exist, when the industry has grown dependent on the product, they can start strangling the community edition.

labbbb OP , 5 months ago

Magento Community Edition is always free, but AWS is not ;(

NeoNachtwaechter , 5 months ago

why then do they continue

It was already open when they acquired it, so the question should rather be: why wouldn’t they?

If they didn’t want to do it, then they would not have acquired it in the first place.