I have some open source projects in my github account. Some of them are currently used by my ex-employer in several projects. Why should an organization have to open source some of its software? Let’s talk about it.

Dissipating some doubts about software quality

Having published your code in public allow many users to take a look to your code and (if it’s good) to dissipate its doubts about if it pays using it or not.

This case is very common in consolidated industries that are looking for a replacement of one software of their stack and need to be sure that the candidate software can be evaluated thoroughly.

Improving collaboration with community

Having some of your software libraries or applications in a public repository can make some developers interested in your product and they can start improving it if it is interesting or useful to them.

In my case, a simple django package I developed to make asynchronous inclusion of templates, django-async-include, has received some merge requests fixing bugs or increasing its functionality.

Creating a community

It is the best way to create a community of external developers that in a future can be integrated in the organization as employees or collaborators.

One way to see it is that, some of the training is free.

This community also can bring a lot of new users, hence acting as a marketing campaign for the company attracting new users.

Giving back

The last reason can be a bit ideological and not somewhat rational. Companies aim to make money but they also should be contribute in the society with their work.

John Carmack is one of the most known figures that defend this point of view.

Conclusion

Open source is not matter of crazy bearded men. It can improve both your company and our society:

• Sharing knowledge.
• Acting as a marketing campaign for your company.
• Getting in contact with a community of developers that already have improved your software.
• Achieving new markets that need viewing the code.