Doubling down on open, Part II

Elastic announced a change in the licensing of its Elasticsearch and Kibana products, moving from an Apache 2.0 license to a dual license model under the Server Side Public License (SSPL) and Elastic License. This shift aims to provide users with free and open access to the software while protecting Elastic's investment and ensuring contributions from cloud service providers that offer these products as a service. The change, set to take effect before the 7.11 release, mirrors similar steps taken by other open source companies and comes in response to evolving market dynamics, particularly regarding SaaS models. Elastic emphasizes that the change will not impact most of its user community, as the default distribution remains free and open, and it continues to engage openly with its community. The SSPL requires that if the software is offered as a service, any modifications and management layer source code must also be publicly released under the same license. Elastic's commitment to transparency and open development remains steadfast as it adapts to protect its software and community.