Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke • Hacker News Board

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#281

Post by quadrangle » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:13 PM UTC

redthrow wrote: post #197

"He says he's made about $25,000 per year since 2001 — a fraction of what he could earn in private industry" The developer of git-annex assistant was happy when he received $20,000 on Kickstarter and he said with this money he could dedicate his time on this project for a full year. [1] Maybe he could also start a Kickstarter/Indiegogo etc campaign so that he could hire another full-time developer? If enough people f…

Cost of living varies widely. Having no dependents and living in an inexpensive place is great. Obviously, it's better for us to fund people who use the funds as efficiently as possible, but we can't demand that everyone's life circumstances be identical.

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#282

Post by JoshTriplett » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:13 PM UTC

teamhappy wrote: post #263

JoshTriplett wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The kind of "open source" I was talking about is source code that is released under a non-free software license. What do we call that? "obnoxious". More seriously, typically something like "look but don't touch", or "proprietary with source available", or "source available under a restrictive license". Microsoft used to call it "shared source", and that term still has those connotations too. Definitely not "open so…

It's common practice in the game industry to license/pay for access to the source code. Whether you end up changing it or not is up to you, but at least you have a choice. This might not be true for Microsoft's "public" source code. I don't know. It looks like we're talking about two very different domains. The Unreal Engine is an example for this kind of business model on a large scale. KoboldTouch (used to be?) an…

> It's common practice in the game industry to license/pay for access to the source code. Whether you end up changing it or not is up to you, but at least you have a choice. This might not be true for Microsoft's "public" source code. I don't know. It looks like we're talking about two very different domains.

Yeah, that's a very different case. It's indeed moderately common for proprietary software frameworks/engines to include source, so that their paying customers can modify and redistribute, but cannot redistribute in source form (modified or otherwise). That's not any more obnoxious than any other kind of proprietary software distribution, and I wouldn't call it "look but don't touch", though it certainly isn't open source or free software.

The case I'm talking about is software with publically available source, but under a restrictive license that doesn't satisfy the OSI or FSF or DFSG definitions. For instance, many random projects on github that don't bother applying a license, or rar (the archive format implementation), or tarsnap, or the extremely obnoxious JSON license.

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#283

Post by Alupis » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:14 PM UTC

trurl wrote: post #193

ryaniscool wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.fsf.org/about/financial The FSF had revenue of 1.25 million in 2013. I'm not trying to comment on where it came from or where it went to. I'm only pointing out that they are not in a very similar position.

This is partly why I stopped donating to the FSF. They're dumping some amount of that money into misguided PR campaigns rather than helping out the developers trying to make free software better.

1.25 million USD is really not a lot of money at all... especially given all of the projects the FSF supports under the GNU umbrella.

If they had zero expenses other than staffers, at a very modest 65,000 USD a year that would not even cover 20 people.

The EFF, FSF are the only real "good guys" out there fighting for your techie rights every day... They could really use your donations and support (even if you don't agree 100% with all of their message).

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#284

Post by dreamdu5t » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:14 PM UTC

briandear wrote: post #187

dreamdu5t wrote: post #132

This shouldn't be odd to anyone who's spent a large amount of time releasing open source. You just end up being used and uncompensated. At best you get a job offer from it. It's really sad to me how many companies benefit from open source (including my own software) without the author ever being compensated. It's hard for me to get motivated to do anything open source anymore because of the feeling that I'm just a gu…

The question is, have you asked for compensation? And, there are plenty of devs at those evil VC-backed companies that give a lot in terms of open source contributions. Those millions of dollars aren't being used to buy private jets; they're paying salaries to devs just like you.

Are you talking about job offers or are you saying that companies cut checks to open source devs at the behest of requests for some money? Who does this?

If you're talking about job offers, you can get jobs without spending off time doing open source. I look over at my co-workers who probably make similar salary as me and they don't do much open source.

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#285

Post by daveloyall » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:15 PM UTC

go1979 wrote: post #62

I like his office setup. Dual monitors, raised base for monitors, plexo? lamp, white board, real keyboard.

IBM Model 30. One of the few keyboards that doubles as a melee weapon. :)

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#286

Post by rmc » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:20 PM UTC

hf wrote: post #64

rmc wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why aren't those organisations paying him money?

You are using Ubuntu, I see from your profile. How much have you paid them? This is how the stories goes: we haven't figured out how to make good work worthwhile. Perhaps we can learn something from our vast experience in profitably peddling shit?

Ubuntu used to (and do sometimes) send banners and CDs. That costs money. Ubuntu/Canonical have money. Why haven't they given some for GPG?

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#287

Post by masmullin » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:21 PM UTC

gandalfu wrote: post #15

agwa wrote: post #4

Calling GnuPG "email encryption software" really understates its importance. It's also used in countless applications to encrypt data at rest, and GPG signatures are used to secure the distribution of software. For instance, GPG is an essential part of the package managers of Debian, Ubuntu, and RedHat. Here is a link to the donation page: https://gnupg.org/donate/index.html

Thanks for the link, just donated!

Me too!

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#288

Post by daveloyall » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:21 PM UTC

anebg wrote: post #180

chkuendig wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FIY: That's 3.8% assuming everybody donated by credit card. Anybody got an idea why they pay so much?

Typical credit card fees are 2.9% + 30c. Assuming that they have regular fees at not non-profit rates(which tend to be lower), it would make their average donation amount to be around $7.14 Source: 48995/689239 = (x*.029+.30)/x

That's in the ballpark for monthly membership fees. ~$10/month.

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#289

Post by drzaiusapelord » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:21 PM UTC

minopret wrote: post #3

Can someone explain why GPG in the person of Werner Koch isn't substantially funded under FSFE? My first thought was the Software Freedom Conservancy. The only reasons I see for them not to take GPG under their wing are lack of will (but why?), sense of funding priorities (but why?), or the possibility that some GPG constituents would be concerned about associating GPG strongly with a US-based organization.

Because this article is misleading. Apparantly, Koch has been subsidized by the german government thus felt no need to be used the FSFE. Secondly, gpg isn't really used for enterprise email, SMIME is or commercial php.

There's a history of Koch that is pretty ugly. He tried to start a consulting company with said government money and seems to have a "pay me to fix bugs" attitude. This breathless "omg must donate now" sentiment dominant here is highly questionable.

gpg should be under and funded by FSFE not via begdonations and german government funding.

Re: Email Encryption Software Relies on One Guy, Who Is Going Broke

#290

Post by SwellJoe » Thu, Feb 05, 2015, 9:21 PM UTC

acveilleux wrote: post #129

rmc wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why aren't those organisations paying him money?

For the most part, they're open source and have no significant revenue. Or they're small for-profit companies and they can't spare the revenue. Or they're large companies and no one with a budget and decision power is even aware they use the product. Or they're Red Hat... With limited budget for this and unlimited needs to cover.

Red Hat is among the largest funders of OSS development in the world. We need more companies acting like Red Hat.

I don't know how we get there when companies like Apple eat such a huge portion of the consumer OS and application dollar and companies like Microsoft and Oracle eat such a huge portion of the corporate dollar.