Eric S. Raymond Calls SaaS 'Dangerous', 'Worse Than Proprietary Software'

After Salesforce warned it retailers to stop selling military-style rifles, a larger issue was identified by Eric S. Raymond: software as a service.

If the provider decides it doesn't want your business, you probably have no real recourse. OK, you could sue for tortious interference in business relationships, but that's chancy and anyway you didn't want to be in a lawsuit, you wanted to conduct your business. This is why 'software as a service' is dangerous folly, even worse than old-fashioned proprietary software at saddling you with a strategic business risk. You don't own the software, the software owns you.

It's 2019 and I feel like I shouldn't have to restate the obvious, but if you want to keep control of your business the software you rely on needs to be open-source. All of it. All of it. And you can't afford it to be tethered to a service provider even if the software itself is nominally open source. Otherwise, how do you know some political fanatic isn't going to decide your product is unclean and chop you off at the knees?

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