After Oracle, should MySQL users stay or go?
How do MySQL users feel about Oracle Corp.'s takeover of the open-source database through its acquisition of Sun Microsystems Inc.? Judging by Twitter, anxious -- and snarky.
"Man, Oracle buying Sun. Please don't wreck MySQL." "Soon MySQL will be called Oracle Lite and to download you must have a support contract costing a million $ per year." "Oracle now owns MySQL?! In related news, the Rebel Alliance has been acquired by Darth Vader for three wookies and a tantan. :("
Oracle and MySQL's many competitors in the database arena were only too eager to second why those fears will come to pass. Others argue that Oracle may prove to be a positive force for MySQL.
One of MySQL's prime attractions is that nearly all of its features are available for free, even those running production databases. Less than one in 1,000 MySQL users ever pay the company a dime, former MySQL CEO Marten Mickos famously admitted.
Sun tried last year to edge toward a dual distribution model, reserving certain key features for paying customers. It quickly backed down after an outcry.
Don't expect Oracle to be as abashed as Sun.
"Companies think 'price increases' and 'usage audits' when they think of Oracle," said Ed Boyajian, CEO of database vendor EnterpriseDB Inc.
Oracle will always have to at least nominally support the free community edition of MySQL, the one that has generated more than 100 million downloads.
But given Oracle's rapacious reputation, users who have invested their time mostly in MySQL should expect to be strongly pressured to open up their wallets.
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Why should users go into a cage?
"...should expect to be strongly pressured to open up their wallets"They may be strongly pressured by Oracle, but if I had set up MySQL and it worked, then why should I pay a company just because it would like me to? If it's a support issue, then the code is out there for someone to maintain. If Oracle does make a future release proprietary, that doesn't affect the use of its predecessor "Free" releases. That's the beauty of Free/Open Source software. If it's out there, then it's out there unencumbered. And as for three versions of MySQL, may the best version win!