SaaS Week

Dave Rosenberg of InfoWorld posted a blog entry following the Dreamforce event in which he reflected on SaaS vs. Open Source. He pointed out a difference between companies that form a "community" vs. those that have an "ecosystem." Clearly open source has much more of a community among developers and SaaS-delivered software is more of a service that is consumed by users. Matt Asay of CNET also commented, saying that "Open source offers the better promise of ecosystem. Ergo, open source wins." But is there even a battle between open source and SaaS? Don't most companies choose SaaS because it's simple and easy to set up, whereas open source often requires configuration and customization? One might think the two served different purposes and aren't really at war at all. As Rosenberg even concluded, a good majority of "new school" SaaS companies have built their sites on open source.