I would say reasonably easy to start with, but needing a lot of ongoing effort for improvements, bug fixes, and so on, which is exactly why I think it's a dangerous combination for a small company.<p>I think they're likely to be an ongoing distraction for the above reason, and also because of the fun/intellectual challenge reason.<p>&#62; punt on it and carry on using it in house.<p>Over time, that kind of thing can (if you're not careful) lead to dangerous cruft, where the in-house divergences pile up to the point where it's no longer so easy to go back and forth between the public/open version.  And thus is born a new species with a far smaller ecosystem than the original.