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  •   over 4 years ago

Free and open source components would kill your marketplace

In my opinion, your requirement to release components as open source (and I suppose, it means that they will be free on https://go.uipath.com) - is huge strategical mistake.
You should check https://marketplace.atlassian.com and their strategy.

If you want to find developers who will develop components for your software - you should give ability to make money for them.
And hackaton prizes isnt an option because

1) Obviously, there are no win guarantees for anybody. You have 242 participants and 11 prizes right now. Plus more participants will join later. Which means less that 5% chance to win. And components would be open sources and, probably, free. Which means, that most participants will give extra value to your software and will not get anything back. Thats just not honest.

2) Obviously, you will get some components after this hackaton. But I would bet, most of them would be "dead code". First version - is just a first step.
If you will check Jira plugins - top plugins have 50-100 versions released.
Who will fix your components, if author will not get money for that?

You may run hackatons each month, you may get hundreds of components, but in long term - all of them would be "dead code". That would kill your marketplace, because nobody will want to look through thousands of "dead" components.

Maybe I dont understand your monetization strategy, let me know if I am wrong.

Thanks, Andrew

  • 5 comments

  •   •   over 4 years ago

    Hi Andrew,

    We appreciate your view of the marketplace and rest assured we have that angle in mind for our roadmap.

    That being said, components for Go! are merely a side benefit of this Hackathon, and by all means not our main focus. Our aim is to engage with our very dear community of users and bring them together in this challenge. To create enthusiasm about problem solving and innovation. To spark new ideas and projects that will help shape the future of RPA.

    Sure, there are prizes at stake, but we believe most of our community is not in it for the money, but for the community, the learning, the excitement that come with it, and last but not least, the recognition.

    Happy Monday,
    Mary

  •   •   over 4 years ago

    Thanks for your answers and explanations, Mary

    Just checking, so you want to build enthusiastic community around commercial software and you expect community to work "not for money"?

    Sorry for stupid questions, but do you get money for your work on UIPath? Do top managers in UIPath get money for their work? Why would I or somebody else work for free on UIPath?

  •   •   over 4 years ago

    Mary could have worded the reply better.
    Communities in open source orgainizations mostly not work on money but to get developing experience and getting to start to communictation with better professionals.
    Sorry for my English .

  •   •   over 4 years ago

    UIPath do have free version, but its not open source actually

  •   •   over 4 years ago

    @andrew - must admit, that our community was not built on the principles of working for money and, actually, most of the thriving communities have done the same, however, regardless of that - we do consider bringing in features on our platforms that will allow best performing professionals to earn money. Stay tuned.

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