MySQL, now owned by Sun, is beginning to limit some features only to paying customers

Open Source database system MySQL, now owned by Sun Microsystems, is beginning to limit some features only to paying customers, according to this article from Computer World:

Open-source darling MySQL is facing a new uprising within its customer base over plans disclosed this week to reserve some key upcoming features, and their source code, for paying users of its namesake database.

Officials at Sun Microsystems Inc., which acquired MySQL in February, confirmed that new online backup capabilities now under development will be offered only to MySQL Enterprise customers — not to the much larger number of users of the free MySQL Community edition.

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It will be interesting to see where this restriction on features heads in the long-term. MySQL is likely the most popular database system for dynamic blogs – including most Wordpress sites and The Blog Herald.