Open source: the practice of abundance
In seeking our own benefit we may tangentially benefit the wider population. But if we make enough room to maximize our own take while simultaneously seeking to do those things that will benefit the whole, I think we end up with a bigger market to monetize.
This means, for example, that it is important for any single open source company to have a strong open source ecosystem around it. The more open source succeeds, the more an individual player can sow from that success (and eventually reap). In the case of my company (Alfresco), we succeed to the extent that there are great open source databases, application servers, operating systems, etc. We could succeed without Red Hat, MySQL, SugarCRM, etc. But we can succeed much, much more in tandem with these others’ success. And vice versa.
John Donne, then, was right. No man is an island, entire of himself, whatever Paul Simon might sing to the contrary. It pays to fund abundance. If you’re an open source company, it pays to selflessly/selfishly strengthen open source projects and open source commercial entities. It’s just good business.