On paying for software • Hacker News Board

Re: On paying for software

#121

Post by sheetjs » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 4:58 PM UTC

ropeadopepope wrote: post #71

wazoox wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use Linux and most free software projects allow donations. I even donated to projects I don't actually use, like FreeBSD. I donated money to many free software projects, Ardour, Mozilla, LibreOffice, OpenBSD, etc. This is clearly a false dichotomy.

The problem with open source is, for some reason, the developers feel no sense of obligation to the end users or the people who donate to them. MacOS devs do and will go out of their way to make sure their software is not just usable, but a sheer pleasure to use in every way possible. Yes, there are exceptions (I'm looking at you, Apple, with your Xcode and your Finder) but for the most part that's just the way thing…

> the developers feel no sense of obligation to the end users or the people who donate to them.

An open source project creates no obligation on the part of the developers. Open source licenses explicitly indemnify the authors. Receiving something for free and expecting something more is the essence of the entitled behavior that frustrate and burn out many open source developers.

A donation is a voluntary gift. Like any other gift, a donation to an open source project is understood to have no strings tied to it. Giving a dollar a month to a project doesn't entitle you to round-the-clock support. If you expect something more, have a conversation with the developers to work out a plan.

P.S.: we (https://sheetjs.com/) build and maintain open source projects (our largest is https://github.com/sheetjs/js-xlsx) and we turn down donations precisely because many people expect something in return. Instead, we offer actual paid support plans and additional features.

Re: On paying for software

#122

Post by eloisant » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:02 PM UTC

justinclift wrote: post #82

TimJYoung wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relying on the good will of others does not work , period. The fact that it works sometimes is not something that one can use as the reason to quit their job and start an "endeavor" (you can't really call it a business). Can we please dispense with this notion and start realizing one simple fact: people will typically only pay for something if you make them pay.

> Can we please dispense with this notion and start realizing one simple fact: people will typically only pay for something if you make them pay. Things to appear to be changing for the better though. As an examply, Gina Häußge is working full time on OctoPrint (3D printing software) supported entirely by donations: https://www.patreon.com/foosel There are probably others too, I'm just not aware of them and have only…

Thibault Duplessis also works full time on lichess.org only with donations.

Re: On paying for software

#123

Post by dman » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:03 PM UTC

carapace wrote: post #115

I've always felt that charging money for software is dumb. I, as a programmer, think about saying to other people that they cannot use a piece of software that is already written unless they give me money, is a damn ridiculous idea. Software is wealth. If I had a gold coin that had the property that I could give it to you and still have it, and that both coins would increase in value when I did, and that you and I bo…

I agree with large parts of what you are saying - the law of scarcity does not apply to software. As a free software advocate however there are a lot of subtle questions to which I have no answer, listing them here in case others can chime in with thoughts

a. Entire categories of software (debuggers, databases, compilers) are now in a state where we have trained users to expect them for free. If you like to spend most of your time writing software then the easiest way to work on such software now is to work for a large company who needs to develop such software to solve their business needs. How do we create solutions such that small indie developers can make a living building software in these categories.

b. Even software that is immensely successful at getting industrial adoption struggles to get any revenue from its users. (OpenSSL / Numpy / Pandas / ZeroMQ etc). Inside a megacorp the person using the software faces an uphill battle fighting a bureaucracy to pay for software that is "free". How do we create platforms / delivery systems where large users of open source can pay for the services.

c. Our collective inability to solve the basic economic problem of delivering a stable revenue for free software has unfortunate side effects where software moves into the cloud or becomes a service because that is the only way to get users to pay on a recurring basis. In my mind this is unfortunate because it lessens the amount of control on execution that the end user has.

d. Developer tools still strongly resemble what was available in the 70s / 80s. I suspect some of this has to do with the fact that there is no easy business model for building developer tools.

Re: On paying for software

#124

Post by kabdib » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:04 PM UTC

matheusmoreira wrote: post #95

todd8 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying that the "phony concept" of copyrights shouldn't exist? Authors and artists (and software developers) would have little incentive to produce in such an environment.

Yes. Lack of incentives didn't stop the artists of the past. Many were able to secure patronage.

You need to consider survivor bias. We don't have data for the number of "artists of the past" who were stopped because they couldn't find patrons. How many Da Vincis and Mozarts had to work in fields or row galleys rather than work as artists?

It is really, really difficult to build a career around patronage. A few people can do it. Most cannot.

The fundamental flaw of the "software should be free because duplication costs are zero" argument is that it ignores the total economic picture of software development. It's like saying "gasoline should be free because it costs next to nothing to run the pump motor at the gas station". Without someone's significant investment of time and money, that software (or that gasoline) is not going to exist. For software, the means of production is not a simple file copy, no matter how easy it is to invoke that COPY command.

We've been paying craftsmen for their work for many thousands of years. Software isn't any different if you take an honest view of the whole process.

Re: On paying for software

#125

Post by candiodari » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:07 PM UTC

Pxtl wrote: post #42

matheusmoreira wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paying for software may be moral , but it certainly isn't natural . As the game's developer, you're the scare resource. Making copies of the finished game itself costs approximately $0. Copyright makes your game artificially scarce so that you can charge for it. It's a phony concept that exists to support an unnatural business model. The real business model should be players paying you directly to develop and update…

> but it certainly isn't natural Neither are money or laws, in that sense.

Remembering a chat with my landlord just a few days ago, I can only say ...

Indeed. Neither are money or laws. Or promises, for that matter.

Re: On paying for software

#126

Post by jkaplowitz » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:14 PM UTC

sheetjs wrote: post #121

ropeadopepope wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with open source is, for some reason, the developers feel no sense of obligation to the end users or the people who donate to them. MacOS devs do and will go out of their way to make sure their software is not just usable, but a sheer pleasure to use in every way possible. Yes, there are exceptions (I'm looking at you, Apple, with your Xcode and your Finder) but for the most part that's just the way thing…

> the developers feel no sense of obligation to the end users or the people who donate to them. An open source project creates no obligation on the part of the developers. Open source licenses explicitly indemnify the authors. Receiving something for free and expecting something more is the essence of the entitled behavior that frustrate and burn out many open source developers. A donation is a voluntary gift. Like a…

Typical paid proprietary licenses also explicitly indemnify the authors.

Re: On paying for software

#127

Post by ThrowawayR2 » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:17 PM UTC

shawnfratis wrote: post #113

I would not have a problem paying for software if what I was paying for didn't suck. Case in point: I have never been very happy with Win 10 since I got it, but in recent weeks it has become completely unusable, mostly because of their constant upgrades and behind-the-scenes processes that slow my machine down to a crawl. Out of frustration I wiped my drive and installed Ubuntu. Granted, Linux has it's share of probl…

> So, one OS is paid and one isn't.

Quoting from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_(company):

Canonical achieved a small operating profit of $281,000 in 2009, however until 2017 it struggled to maintain financial solvency and took a major financial hit from the development of Unity and Ubuntu Touch, leading to an operating loss of $21.6 Million for the fiscal year 2013.[19] The company reported an operating profit of $2 Million in 2017 after shutting down the Unity development team and laying off nearly 200 employees. The company now plans to focus on its server and professional support solutions, which have proved to be most profitable. By shifting resources away from Ubuntu Desktop and cutting less profitable products and services, Canonical plans to maintain solvency and achieve long-term profitability.

"one isn't" (your words) to the extent that they had to switch focus away from the desktop OS to stay afloat. Much as people would like to pretend otherwise, the almighty dollar/euro/yen/etc. is still what matters most.

Re: On paying for software

#128

Post by ttoinou » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:17 PM UTC

bachmeier wrote: post #63

greysteil wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great blog post - thanks for writing it. I've had the same experience with people asking for an MIT license on dependabot-core (the public repo that holds the core logic for my SaaS business, but which has no license and a comment saying those who wish to use it for commercial gain should contact me instead). I already give the product away for free to open source projects and anyone using it in a personal capacity,…

> by owning the codebase I can protect myself from a larger player copying my work I find this statement confusing. In what sense do you not "own" your codebase if you release it under the GPL? And if the software is released under the GPL, large players have no advantage, because they have to release all of the changes they make to your code if they're using it to compete against you. What you're saying is that rest…

   In what sense do you not "own" your codebase if you release it under the GPL?

There is no concept of property for information. By hiding your source codebase and the way it is being built (the same logic applies to your DAW music project, your video software editing file project etc...) you are making life harder for people who try to replicate features of your software, understand techniques behind it or pretend to be you to sell the software instead of you (others examples are welcome).

So I can understand that the GP /feels/ like he owns it more, even if it is just a feeling.

Re: On paying for software

#129

Post by shawnfratis » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:20 PM UTC

>Ubuntu gives you a very clear option to pay for it when you download it.

If it works for you and you want it to keep working, making a donation/payment may not be the worst idea.

Yes, agreed. However, one of the points I think I'm trying to make is that that paying for a piece of software doesn't automatically make it better quality. I think that a lot of people in the free software world do try and put as much effort into making a good product as the ones in the paid world. Even under the pressure of not knowing how they're going to pay their mortgage. :/

Re: On paying for software

#130

Post by rolandas » Sun, Jun 10, 2018, 5:20 PM UTC

Great post.

On the same note, paying for software has psychological benefits for the person as well, which I wrote about recently https://rolandas.blog/posts/id-rather-pay-for-software-than-...