Bre Pettis Responds To Comments

It looks like damage control is the first thing on today’s to-do list. Bre Pettis responded to many of the comments on his original blog post.

His overall point seems to be that he’s not going to be, or can’t be, more specific because there just isn’t a clearly defined business model for what they’re doing.

Folks really want a black or white answer, but in my experience, it just doesn’t work that way when combining open source, hardware, and business. There is an open hardware definition, but it’s a far throw from a business model.

I’m not convinced that open source hardware is actually a business model.

I’d rather experiment and develop a business model that shares obsessively while still being sustainable and creating jobs…

I totally get that people wish we would fail or die trying. You are catching us at a moment where we are trying to figure out how to share as much as possible without failing

I used to think that open source automatically meant winning. I’m not convinced that is all it takes any more. I believe that tenacity, growth, collaboration, hard work and being able to compete with non-open competitors are all critical in being sustainable as a business.

There is an open hardware definition, but there isn’t a clear business model. Sorry for the orwellian feel, I’m trying to be clear about where we’re at and the challenges we have.