What caused a prolific blogger and open source expert to flip flop on open source business models? Fellow open source blogger, runner and twitterer Matt Asay posted a recent story saying it’s ok to be an open source flip flopper: For years, open source divided itself into purists (of which I was part) and the hybrids (or “mutts,” as one friend called it while I was at Novell, a hybrid open-source company). What nonsense, to use the Welches’ phrasing.We make open source entirely too ideological, too political. As I discovered at the New York CTO Club, the open-source vendor community, enterprise IT buyers care far more about whether software works (and is sold at a compelling price) than they do about its ideological wrappings. On that day, I became a flip-flopper. I’ve been much happier ever since and, I feel, much more community and customer-focused.I happened to be out on a run with Matt back in January long before the posting and asked him what caused him to change his mind. Matt admitted he had shifted 180 degrees in his thinking. But his answer was very simple. In fact, it came down to one thing: he owned a quota.It’s one thing to be a purist when you’re a spokesman. But when it comes time to close deals and grow a business, you have to give customers an incentive to buy. Personally, I’ve always been pragmatic about open source. At MySQL we often told partners and customers that open source wasn’t a religious decision, just a good model for development and distribution. And more importantly, we didn’t ask people to convert religions in order to work with us. While I respect the open source purists, I’m glad that there are many people who are pragmatic in assessing what techniques make sense for their business, especially in today’s tough economic climate. But no doubt others will feel differently on this issue. Maybe we’ll just end up re-hashing the whole “open core” issue. Let me know your comments below. Open Source