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Open Source Maintenance Fee

github.com

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Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#211

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

kube-system wrote: post #209
ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #91

>While the source code is freely available under the terms of the LICENSE, all other aspects of the project--including opening or commenting on issues, participating in discussions and downloading releases--require adherence to the Maintenance Fee. Surprised downloading releases is in there, I'm not a lawyer but I'm pretty sure this goes against it's own license on the source code, specifically: >each contributor gra…

The license snippet you quoted means that they have given YOU the right to copy, change (or compile), and redistribute, distribute anything you've created from it. Nothing about that implies contributors are required to give you binaries. This isn't all that uncommon -- usually open source licenses only apply to the source. > comically easy to bypass and literally forces someone to automate a github mirror that build…

>I'm not sure if I would call this a "bypass" -- this is the typical way FOSS software has always worked, and it's part of the reason why FOSS is popular :)

Any other packages you know of that are open source but have a trap license where if you download it through the package manager you owe them money? :)

Plus the license mentions the binaries have to be distributed with the same license. Attaching a "if you click this download button you owe us $10000" button doesn't seem very typical to common FOSS values :) I'd say a big reason FOSS is so popular is the free and open source nature :)

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#212

Post by CodesInChaos »

freeopinion wrote: post #84

I guess I'm not smart enough to understand [edit: the hype around] this. The license agreement doesn't change? But you don't get support unless you pay the maintenance fee? So if a user reports an exploit, Wix won't fix it unless the reporter pays the maintenance fee first? Or if some corporate user has a great idea for a new feature, Wix will ignore it until a paying user requests it? It seems obvious that this is n…

The license of the source code doesn't change. The license of the official binaries (which the official nuget packages contain) did change.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#213

Post by kube-system »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #211
kube-system wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The license snippet you quoted means that they have given YOU the right to copy, change (or compile), and redistribute, distribute anything you've created from it. Nothing about that implies contributors are required to give you binaries. This isn't all that uncommon -- usually open source licenses only apply to the source. > comically easy to bypass and literally forces someone to automate a github mirror that build…

>I'm not sure if I would call this a "bypass" -- this is the typical way FOSS software has always worked, and it's part of the reason why FOSS is popular :) Any other packages you know of that are open source but have a trap license where if you download it through the package manager you owe them money? :) Plus the license mentions the binaries have to be distributed with the same license. Attaching a "if you click…

> Any other packages you know of that are open source but have a trap license where if you download it through the package manager you owe them money? :)

It's pretty common in Google Play and the Apple App Store. The only difference here is that payment is on the honors system.

> Plus the license mentions the binaries have to be distributed with the same license.

Sure, but there's nothing in that license that says you can't ask for money for the binaries. The only requirement of distribution in the license is:

> (A) Reciprocal Grants- For any file you distribute that contains code from the software (in source code or binary format), you must provide recipients the source code to that file [...]

It doesn't say: "if you distribute source, you must distribute binaries"

You are free to ask for money for the binaries. Now, due to the terms of the license, anyone else could distribute that binary. But it doesn't require you to do it for free.

> Attaching a "if you click this download button you owe us $10000" button doesn't seem very typical to common FOSS values :) I'd say a big reason FOSS is so popular is the free and open source nature :)

FOSS distributions have been commercially sold for many decades. I bought my first copy of Linux. FOSS has traditionally only applied to source code and any related activities have long been left open for commercial opportunity. This is how FOSS companies afford to operate.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#214

Post by elsjaako »

thayne wrote: post #98
derefr wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or if you open issues I feel like there should be an exception carved out to this policy, if the submitter of an issue is offering to create (or, as a corporation, dedicate their own engineers' time to creating) a PR to resolve the problem the issue describes. As a maintainer of a few OSS projects myself, I see my fair share of "choosing beggars" (i.e. people who don't mentally model others' motivations, and so use…

It's complicated. Reviewing a PR takes time and effort, and the maintainer may not want to do that for a feature that mainly benefits a company that isn't paying the maintenance fee. OTOH, as a maintainer, if a company finds a bug that would impact a lot of users, I would want them to report it, regardless of their payment status. But saying something like "Issues from paying customers/donors have higher priority" is…

I think this is one of those issues that only exists in theory, not in practice.

If a company reports a bug in a clear and helpful way, it's probably going to get looked at anyway.

Also, if a company cares enough about Wix to bother finding and documenting a bug, they should be willing to pay $60 for the software.

So this is only a problem in the case where a company finds a bug, decides to report it, refuses to pay a minimal fee, and the maintainers are strict enough with themselves to ignore it because of the source. That feels unlikely to me.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#215

Post by robmensching »

entuno wrote: post #207
derefr wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or if you open issues I feel like there should be an exception carved out to this policy, if the submitter of an issue is offering to create (or, as a corporation, dedicate their own engineers' time to creating) a PR to resolve the problem the issue describes. As a maintainer of a few OSS projects myself, I see my fair share of "choosing beggars" (i.e. people who don't mentally model others' motivations, and so use…

And also an exception for reporting security-related issues. Because if you try and charge people money to responsibly report security vulnerabilities, then they'll just end up taking the full disclosure approach, which is probably not what you want.

Oh, definitely. CVEs have a special place to be reported in GitHub.

PSA: Do NOT use the issue tracker to report a CVE. That makes everyone's life difficult. Go through the correct channel.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#216

Post by robmensching »

richrichardsson wrote: post #192
digianarchist wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's shocking to me that Microsoft aren't heavily involved with the project considering it's one of the fundamental frameworks for releasing software on Windows. I've had the displeasure of using Wix and it's an incredibly complicated and poorly documented platform that had us reaching for paid competitors in order to get our installer shipped. I realized shortly after that it's not really Wix's fault. Windows is squ…

> it's an incredibly complicated and poorly documented So much this. I was interested in using WiX, but it's just impenetrable for a noob, and any "beginners" guides were either hugely out of date or just assumed you understood what GUID you should be using and if it was important or not to change the example they gave. Quickly gave up. :(

I'm not sure you're still interested but our Quick Start is much, much better and rolls straight into our tutorial. Now there is still a lot of work for us to do but it's better.

I made the huge mistake of believing that the community would help with documentation. I knew working with the internals of the Windows Installer would be challenging for most developers, but I really thought they'd help share what they learned and contribute to the documentation. Almost no one did. So, I've picked it up as a task we're doing at FireGiant... but there is a lot to do and it will take time.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#217

Post by robmensching »

csomar wrote: post #201
opticfluorine wrote: post #26

I came across this a few months ago when I was evaluating open source installer options for my own open source project. I have no issue with charging for binaries while the source is available under an OSI license, but this from the README rubbed me the wrong way: "To ensure the long-term sustainability of this project, use of the WiX Toolset requires an Open Source Maintenance Fee. While the source code is freely av…

If you read the comments on the GitHub issue, the guys seems more than reasonable. My understanding is that they want you pay if you are making money. My guess if you are just a one-person show with a just-started product, they probably won't care much. Here is their sponsorship page: https://github.com/sponsors/wixtoolset

Yeah, that's basically it.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#218

Post by robmensching »

threemux wrote: post #208

Hah - Legal at my company wouldn't respond to this by forcing us to pay. They'd take one look at that bizarre EULA and tell us to stop using the product entirely. I suspect this is what will happen in most cases. Perhaps that's fine in the eyes of the maintainers! But I say this every time someone says they want to restrict commercial use while still being Open Source: just slap AGPL on it. It's radioactive to enterp…

This hasn't been the case as of yet. We've had many large companies just pay the sponsorship. Honestly, the problem is not the EULA, it's the need for more flexibility in invoicing than GitHub Sponsors provides today.

To say it another way, legal is cool with it, the challenge now is making it easy for procurement.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#219

Post by robmensching »

jononor wrote: post #190
kindkang2024 wrote: post #173

Open-source projects often function like a system of charity and honor. The honor goes to the contributors, while the charitable benefits flow to those who can use it to generate revenue. This model works well for both parties and indirectly benefits humanity. However, I personally believe—perhaps naively—that the charity could be directed toward all humans in a more direct and obvious way. For example, when a projec…

I like the idea. But it is missing something to actually get money out of companies, I think? Because even when there are people in a company that are nominally willing to pay, there is usually so much friction/hassle to actually get money out of a company - that it most often ends up not happening for open source. Unless there is something that "forces" them.

Yeah. My experiences with the OSMF is that companies won't pay for charity, but they will comply with licenses.

Re: Open Source Maintenance Fee

#220

Post by robmensching »

acoustics wrote: post #180
mirsadm wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am starting to think that the open source licenses need to be updated to specifically exclude large tech companies and force them to pay.

Big tech companies use open-source software primarily because it is free and unencumbered. If an author uses a license that makes big tech pay, they will not pay. They will just not use the software. We already see a similar dynamic with AGPL. It's easy to fall into a trap of thinking "I have several big companies using this software. If I had charged a reasonable license fee, I'd be making $100k/yr on this project."…

> If an author uses a license that makes big tech pay, they will not pay.

That's not my experience.

> But, of course, if the project has started with this license, it never would have gotten to the point where several big companies were using it.

That is very possible. We'll have to wait to see if any projects start with a maintenance fee then become popular.

> "hey do you want to set a norm of commercial users paying to use your software?"

My ideal would for the norm to shift such that companies think, "We're using this Open Source project, are we already paying the maintenance fee?" I don't know if that will actually work out but I know that if we don't try it will not.

The OSMF is my attempt to find out.

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