[mook]

Are you okay with Amazon taking your code and setting up their own version of SaaS for it? Not saying it'd make financial sense for them, just that… once you open source it they can do what they want.

Also remember that open sourcing something isn't a marketing panacea; you can still struggle to get people interested in it afterwards. It's a useful step if it calms your customers since they don't have to worry as much if you go away, and your value isn't the actual software but support around it or something along those lines.

[MarkinK]

Yes, I understand the risk, but I really care about trying something new and risky and getting more users rather than running a slow-growing business. If Amazon steals it from me tomorrow, I think I will celebrate for a week :-)

[abbradar]

I'll add to the MarkinK's reply: the idea is that CRM/ERP target audience:

* Requires a considerable amount of integrations, customizations, and other "stuff on top";

* Has huge fears about vendor lock-ins and the possibility of unforeseen migrations/support costs.

So yes, the idea is that allowing not only custom deployments, but competitor SaaS businesses built on top of it can raise the market for the added services. Whether that would really work this way or not is a question we'd be dying to know the answer for :D