Author: Aindrila Mitra

Open source feels free. Code moves fast. Teams ship from everywhere. That freedom is why open source wins. But there is a quiet risk many teams miss until it hurts. Governments care deeply about who gets certain tech, who can use it, and where it flows. Even if your code is public. Even if you…

AI is moving fast. Faster than most founders expect. You can train a model in weeks, ship in months, and get users even faster. But there is one quiet risk that can undo all of that progress if you ignore it. That risk is compliance around the data and models you use. This is not…

If you are raising money or thinking about a sale, your code will be opened, touched, and questioned. Not in a casual way. In a very serious way. Investors and buyers will dig into it because your code is the product. If it breaks, leaks, or belongs to someone else, deals slow down or die.…

Open source is no longer just about sharing code. It is about building trust, growing a real community, and turning that trust into a strong business. Many founders start with open source because it feels right and because it helps adoption grow fast. Then a hard question shows up. How do you make money without…

If you are building a database, a core backend tool, or deep infrastructure software, the license you choose can quietly decide your future. It can shape who uses your product, who pays you, who copies you, and how hard it is to protect what you built. Most founders realize this too late. This article exists…

If you are building software today, the license you choose can help you win—or quietly set you up to lose. Business Source License (BSL) and Server Side Public License (SSPL) were created to solve a real problem: big cloud companies taking open source work, selling it, and giving nothing back. On paper, both licenses sound…

Open-sourcing your code can feel like giving away the crown jewels. For some startups, it turns into fuel that drives growth. For others, it quietly kills leverage, value, and future options. The difference is not luck. It is timing, intent, and protection. This article is about making that choice with clear eyes. Not from a…

If you are building software, you are dealing with forks and contributions whether you like it or not. The moment someone touches your code, copies it, improves it, or builds on top of it, questions about ownership show up. These questions do not wait until you are ready. They appear early, often quietly, and they…

Private and public repos may look the same to an engineer, but they trigger very different compliance realities for a startup. A private repo keeps your work controlled, time-boxed, and flexible, which means you still decide when and how your invention is exposed to the world. A public repo, on the other hand, is a…

If you build mobile apps, you are already using open source code, even if you do not realize it. Every mobile app today sits on layers of shared code. Operating systems, system libraries, SDKs, and tiny helper files written by strangers across the world. This shared code makes it possible to build fast, ship often,…