Ideas for a semi-commercial & open-source startup

DSLC

Hello. I'm a junior embedded systems engineer currently working in Dublin, and am interested in helping to start an interdisciplinary engineering organisation with like-minded people - with a focus on open-source technologies and development and with a "semi-commercial" ethos.

I posted about this in the "open-source" forum circa 18 months ago (here is the link). Although there was some interest, it didn't gain traction. Now that I have at least a little more experience under my belt, I thought I'd stick my neck out again.

I have posted full details on my website - here. I will try to summarise the vital points here.

The links above mention some of my interest areas - and I welcome other people's suggestions and ideas for projects also. The specific projects we take on would be heavily contingent on the specific competencies that people bring.

Aside from your competencies and interest areas, I am most definitely concerned about your values - including your attitude to open-source. (I am a fairly strong proponent of open-source software and hardware, but I'm not dogmatic about it.) I have gone in to more detail about this on my website link.

If anyone's interested, send me a PM or find my contact details on my website.

Lastly, if anyone has suggestions on where I might find interested parties, do let me know.

godtabh

What are you looking to do with open source?

Do you have a product or service that you want to bring the market?

DSLC

Hi.

godtabh wrote: »

What are you looking to do with open source?

Both use it (i.e. FLOSS) for development and release much of our own work under open-source licenses. (I use Linux almost all of the time myself, and almost all of the engineering applications I use are open-source. I'm also content - to the extent feasible - to contribute much of what I develop myself back to the open-source community.)

Do you have a product or service that you want to bring the market?

Not yet, no. (I'm quite up-front about that in the article linked to above.)

godtabh

So its just a hobby club?

timmyntc

Well depending on your particular area of endeavour, you might get a research grant from any number of institutions, or else sponsorship from some private entity. It happens quite a lot with experimental/open-source software. IIRC, the MINIX kernel development program has garnered quite a formidable amount of funding for what is ultimately a free and open-sourced piece of software.

However aside from that I can't imagine you'll attract many volunteers if they won't be getting any form of compensation for their efforts. So I'd advise you to get brainstorming first, then look for funding/contributors second. Nobody wants to commit to a non-existant FOSS project.

godtabh

timmyntc wrote: »

However aside from that I can't imagine you'll attract many volunteers if they won't be getting any form of compensation for their efforts. So I'd advise you to get brainstorming first, then look for funding/contributors second. Nobody wants to commit to a non-existant FOSS project.

I think people would be more interested if there was a vision or strategy as to what you are trying to develop. People might see the potential then and be willing to work towards something with an equity stake.

DSLC

Hi godtabh / timmy. Ok. I appreciate the feedback - and accept the criticism. Hopefully I'll have some time over the coming months to focus more on specific projects, and might have a clearer vision and strategy at the end of it.