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Generating Income from Open Source

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Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#11

Post by chii »

slondr wrote: post #6
monero-xmr wrote: post #2

Charging for a commercial license is virtual closed-source. You have reinvented selling software, except with a “try before you buy” model that enables engineers to vet its utility first before paying, with free usage for non-profits (i.e. other non-profit devs). I’m not making any comment about the merits of this model. I strictly make and sell closed-source software (SaaS). But it’s funny to me that this is essenti…

Free as in free speech, not as in free beer. This has been a slogan of free software for decades. Charging money for your software is not in any way incompatible with open source.

> Charging money for your software is not in any way incompatible with open source

of course not.

But nobody has successfully been able to charge for it, without additional things such as services/support etc.

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#12

Post by memefrog »

monero-xmr wrote: post #2

Charging for a commercial license is virtual closed-source. You have reinvented selling software, except with a “try before you buy” model that enables engineers to vet its utility first before paying, with free usage for non-profits (i.e. other non-profit devs). I’m not making any comment about the merits of this model. I strictly make and sell closed-source software (SaaS). But it’s funny to me that this is essenti…

It is not "virtually closed source" to license something as GPLv3 and also under a proprietary license. In fact, it is something explicitly advocated for by Richard Stallman himself and the Free Software Foundation generally:

https://www.fsf.org/blogs/rms/selling-exceptions

He's got mixed feelings, but says "I consider selling exceptions an acceptable thing for a company to do, and I will suggest it where appropriate as a way to get programs freed."

If of all people rms considers something acceptable, then whatever that thing is, it certainly can't be described as "virtually closed source".

If you release something as open source software, then it is open source software. The end. That's what the term means. Also licensing it under a proprietary license doesn't change that. Free software licensing is not "try before you buy", and it is not "free usage for non-profits". Open source and "not for profit" are not synonyms de facto or de jure. You can use GPL'd software in commercial products and in fact many people do, frequently. You probably have a dozen copies of Linux in your house in various appliances that you don't even know are there. There are many other examples.

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#13

Post by nhumrich »

larrydag wrote: post #4

I've always looked at charging for open source as a support service. What is the developer's time worth? If one wants new features pay a fee/salary/bounty for the development.

This leads to the problem of stopping to pay once the feature you care about exists. Software is an interesting problem where you build once sell a lot. It's not economical if you sell once and give the rest for free. There are a lot of software products that I use, that I don't personally need more features for, so I would have no incentive to pay. My usefulness has been subsidized by others.

In other words, I don't think it's a sustainable way to support open source projects

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#14

Post by memefrog »

godelski wrote: post #7
monero-xmr wrote: post #2

Charging for a commercial license is virtual closed-source. You have reinvented selling software, except with a “try before you buy” model that enables engineers to vet its utility first before paying, with free usage for non-profits (i.e. other non-profit devs). I’m not making any comment about the merits of this model. I strictly make and sell closed-source software (SaaS). But it’s funny to me that this is essenti…

I really think these kinds of comments are counter productive to people seeing source available software (SAS, OSS, FOSS, or all three). Free to the public but not corporate is clearly not "try before you buy" and is a gross misinterpretation of this. I don't care what Citizens United ruling said, corporations are not the same as people and we should distinguish them as such. This model is in no way functionally simi…

"Source available" is not open source and has nothing to do with open source. Open source never confused people until bad-faith actors started intentionally trying to confuse them by labeling things that aren't open source as "open source". Open source has a precise definition and it has had it for decades. If you describe your software as open source and it is not available under an open source license then you are a malicious bad-faith fraudster that is trying to use the reputation of open source software to prop up a fraudulent practice based on lies.

It doesn't matter one whit whether people can "pay the bills". It's totally irrelevant to the discussion. If you can't make money making open source software, then go get a job. This is like people complaining they did a degree in underwater basket weaving and can't get a job, or people complaining that they can't get a job as an artist or a guitarist. Guess what, most people can't make money from their hobbies. Some programmers get pretty lucky and turn their hobbies into jobs. If you want to give it a go, good on you. Most people don't even want to. Of those that do want to, most do not succeed. You have no entitlement to be successful in your attempts to do so.

And there's no rule that says that you have to release things you make as open source software. If you want to make money, you might find that the best way to do that is not to release your software as open source. That's your prerogative. But you can't make that choice and then also choose to ride on the reputation of the "open source" label. That label means something, and has meant the same thing for decades. You can choose: release your software as open source and call it that, or release it as "source available" and be honest about it.

And you're completely wrong when you say "They have not won the culture war on what the term means". They absolutely have. The only place I've ever seen anyone pretend that "open source" can legitimately mean something other than the OSI's definition is on this forum.

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#15

Post by Buttons840 »

I recently ran across the the license for Dragonfly [1] which has some restrictions (rights reserved), but 5 years after the license date the license switches to Apache 2.0. Basically a time-limited rights reservation. I don't hate it. I might even contribute to such a project for free.

I propose something like this: When I release code, it's rights-reserved for 5 years, then open-source (and this particular clause would be irrevocable). Anyone may use the software for non-commercial purposes. Anyone may contribute, those who contribute will be granted permission for commercial use if I deem their contributions significant enough. Anyone may distribute the software under these terms.

If such a model became popular, I have a hard time imagining it could make things any worse. It might even accelerate open-source development by shifting societies resources to those who are actually producing this valuable software.

You might say, "but it's not open-source", fair enough, but we can view it as open-source contribution with a delay. For example, if this model became widely popular this year, and we saw great progress with this model, then come 2028 we would be flooded with new open-source software and ultimately might be better off than we would have been without this model.

Ultimately people choose to make their software open-source for moral reasons, and because they hope that by giving they might receive in turn--I contribute, you contribute, and we share freely (and we're both poor). This model I've talked about still achieves similar goals. People might still be willing to contribute, even for free, because I have given them an irrevocable legal promise that their contributions will be made available to all at a specific time.

(This whole thing makes me rethink copyright and patents and how much they really contribute to society. Perhaps their terms should be shortened?)

[1]: https://github.com/dragonflydb/dragonfly/blob/main/LICENSE.m...

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#16

Post by ezekg »

memefrog wrote: post #14
godelski wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really think these kinds of comments are counter productive to people seeing source available software (SAS, OSS, FOSS, or all three). Free to the public but not corporate is clearly not "try before you buy" and is a gross misinterpretation of this. I don't care what Citizens United ruling said, corporations are not the same as people and we should distinguish them as such. This model is in no way functionally simi…

"Source available" is not open source and has nothing to do with open source. Open source never confused people until bad-faith actors started intentionally trying to confuse them by labeling things that aren't open source as "open source". Open source has a precise definition and it has had it for decades . If you describe your software as open source and it is not available under an open source license then you are…

> The only place I've ever seen anyone pretend that "open source" can legitimately mean something other than the OSI's definition is on this forum.

I don’t think this is entirely accurate in practice. I talk to businesses, individuals, and enterprises every single day and they all refer to my SAS as open source software. So I don’t think everybody sees OSS like you and OSI wills them to. I’m stepping on toes by saying that, but from my sample size, that’s what I see and hear.

The only places I’ve seen this dogma is here on HN, in GitHub issues about gaslighting [^0], and on r/opensource.

[^0]: https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n/issues/40 (and other linked issues therein)

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#17

Post by scrollaway »

memefrog wrote: post #14
godelski wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really think these kinds of comments are counter productive to people seeing source available software (SAS, OSS, FOSS, or all three). Free to the public but not corporate is clearly not "try before you buy" and is a gross misinterpretation of this. I don't care what Citizens United ruling said, corporations are not the same as people and we should distinguish them as such. This model is in no way functionally simi…

"Source available" is not open source and has nothing to do with open source. Open source never confused people until bad-faith actors started intentionally trying to confuse them by labeling things that aren't open source as "open source". Open source has a precise definition and it has had it for decades . If you describe your software as open source and it is not available under an open source license then you are…

> It doesn't matter one whit whether people can "pay the bills". It's totally irrelevant to the discussion. If you can't make money making open source software, then go get a job.

What a terrible fucking take.

First of all yes it matters. OSS developers not being able to pay their bills despite maintaining software used by trillion dollar corps has been in the news several times. It’s an ongoing issue and talked about a lot.

Second, “go get a job” is essentially “stop doing open source”. As in “I would rather have you write closed source software than source available/open core”.

This isn’t your decision to take. This isn’t your life to live. And this isn’t your culture to dictate.

Also, you live in a bubble if you think the majority of people give a crap about the OSI definition. I say this as someone who does give a crap (though not that big of one).

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#18

Post by chaxor »

slondr wrote: post #6
monero-xmr wrote: post #2

Charging for a commercial license is virtual closed-source. You have reinvented selling software, except with a “try before you buy” model that enables engineers to vet its utility first before paying, with free usage for non-profits (i.e. other non-profit devs). I’m not making any comment about the merits of this model. I strictly make and sell closed-source software (SaaS). But it’s funny to me that this is essenti…

Free as in free speech, not as in free beer. This has been a slogan of free software for decades. Charging money for your software is not in any way incompatible with open source.

The main important part of open source, regardless of license, is that you have the ability to run it locally to ensure that the code written and provided is what is used for your interaction with the code (since obviously a company or entity can lie and provide code that is different than what is used as the SaS. Tailscale and Headscale come to mind.

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#19

Post by MatthiasPortzel »

Buttons840 wrote: post #15

I recently ran across the the license for Dragonfly [1] which has some restrictions (rights reserved), but 5 years after the license date the license switches to Apache 2.0. Basically a time-limited rights reservation. I don't hate it. I might even contribute to such a project for free. I propose something like this: When I release code, it's rights-reserved for 5 years, then open-source (and this particular clause w…

That license is the Business Source License, created for MariaDB I believe:

=> https://mariadb.com/bsl-faq-adopting/ MariaDB - Adopting and Developing BSL Software

I've also noticed Sentry using it. I think it address one of the the main criticisms of proprietary licenses, while still allowing a company to form a considerable moat around their software. (I think we can agree, death of author + 70 years is way too long for code source, but 5 years of copyright seems perfectly reasonable.)

Re: Generating Income from Open Source

#20

Post by kiba »

scrollaway wrote: post #17
memefrog wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Source available" is not open source and has nothing to do with open source. Open source never confused people until bad-faith actors started intentionally trying to confuse them by labeling things that aren't open source as "open source". Open source has a precise definition and it has had it for decades . If you describe your software as open source and it is not available under an open source license then you are…

> It doesn't matter one whit whether people can "pay the bills". It's totally irrelevant to the discussion. If you can't make money making open source software, then go get a job. What a terrible fucking take. First of all yes it matters. OSS developers not being able to pay their bills despite maintaining software used by trillion dollar corps has been in the news several times. It’s an ongoing issue and talked abou…

We should absolutely be finding business models that work for open source but not compromising the ethic of it, like open core.

It probably just won't make a ridiculous amount of money for open source developers. It's the tradeoff you have to make when deciding to write open source or proprietary software.

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