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Turning a side project into an open-source project

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Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#31

Post by bluGill »

sudhirj wrote: post #27

On the subject of OSS projects on the side, I'm really interested in the dual licensing model - I'd like to have my code licensed under a strict copyleft license so people can see the code, but a more permissive license so businesses can use it. Based on articles like http://www.mikeperham.com/2015/11/23/how-to-charge-for-your-... I've figured out the following: OSS license - AGPL - I'm building web services distribu…

AGPL doens't force bushiness to buy a license. They can use your code at no cost and modify at will so long as they make their changes available AGPL.

What you want is dual license. First is AGPL: you accept that some companies will use the free code - get over it. Second is a non-open source license: your lawyers write it, those who buy this license don't have to share changes (which could be made by you or them).

The hard part is not the license, the hard part is the business model so you don't go bankrupt. Since AGPL is always available what do you offer so that a company will pay you? (there are many good answers, just make sure you have one)

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#32

Post by joeblau »

poyu wrote: post #24
joeblau wrote: post #14

This is a great guide. I followed the similar steps for https://gitignore.io I was doing a lot of development work and going to github.com/github/gitignore to copy templates from GitHub's website to my own file system was getting tedious. What I wanted was a simple command line tool like gi java > .gitignore So I built it over the course of a week while at Mammoth CA. I was on a snowboard trip so I would ride during…

Hey, thanks for the site! I use it all the time! Great tool to have!

You're welcome. Glad it's helping.

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#33

Post by sudhirj »

bluGill wrote: post #31
sudhirj wrote: post #27

On the subject of OSS projects on the side, I'm really interested in the dual licensing model - I'd like to have my code licensed under a strict copyleft license so people can see the code, but a more permissive license so businesses can use it. Based on articles like http://www.mikeperham.com/2015/11/23/how-to-charge-for-your-... I've figured out the following: OSS license - AGPL - I'm building web services distribu…

AGPL doens't force bushiness to buy a license. They can use your code at no cost and modify at will so long as they make their changes available AGPL. What you want is dual license. First is AGPL: you accept that some companies will use the free code - get over it. Second is a non-open source license: your lawyers write it, those who buy this license don't have to share changes (which could be made by you or them). T…

> AGPL doens't force bushiness to buy a license. They can use your code at no cost and modify at will so long as they make their changes available AGPL.

Because the AGPL counts network access as distribution, it would force businesses to open source their private codebases that communicated with my service - which is enough of deterrent to freeloading for me.

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#34

Post by dovyski »

spieglt wrote: post #11

I was just worrying last night that I've released my side project too early, so glad to hear someone encouraging imperfect-but-usable releases. If anyone has advice on finding users, testers, and contributors besides posting on Show HN, please let me know. https://github.com/spieglt/flyingcarpet

Awesome, project! I can't even count how many times I needed something precisely like FlyingCarpet. Please spread the word about your project.

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#35

Post by penrods »

sudhirj wrote: post #27

On the subject of OSS projects on the side, I'm really interested in the dual licensing model - I'd like to have my code licensed under a strict copyleft license so people can see the code, but a more permissive license so businesses can use it. Based on articles like http://www.mikeperham.com/2015/11/23/how-to-charge-for-your-... I've figured out the following: OSS license - AGPL - I'm building web services distribu…

Some thoughts from a guy who has done a lot with licenses:

As others have stated, GPL/AGPL or anything "open" does NOT force business to buy a license. All it says it that _if_ they use your code, they have to make the code available to their users. (Today that often gets interpreted as made public, but it truly only requires that the users have access to it). So the business CAN still freely sell software that uses your code without your involvement in any way.

If you want to be paid by every business that uses your code, don't make it public. There really isn't any other way to force that behavior.

As far a commercial license goes, just basically just say it belongs to you and no usage is allowed without arrangements with you. That is generally wrapped up in a contract between you and the business. I haven't used it, but you can try a tool like this to generate that type commercial license: http://www.binpress.com/license/generator

One of the real advantages of going open for you (the author) is getting help from other people. Often it is small things, but you can get help. Doing a Dual License complicates this. As long as you are the owner of the code you can freely re-license it. But once you accept a code contribution to your GPL code, you cannot legally or ethically just resell that contributed code under the commercial license. So you either: 1) Reject all contributions from other programmers 2) Have two independent branches that might end up diverging 3) Asking every code contributor to grant you a license to also use their code under your commercial license.

To me, option #3 is questionable and probably won't fly well if your project takes off.

We moved Mycroft (https://github.com/MycroftAI/mycroft-core) from GPLv3 to Apache 2.0. There were various reason for this, but for us the biggest was that business generally avoids GPL code, and in some cases there the regulatory system comes in conflict with the requirements of GPL. For example, if a car brake system has GPLv3 code you are REQUIRED to provide a mechanism so users can replace that code. Good luck getting approval of a car. Even if you did get it approved, the car manufacturers would be terrified of the court cases they'd have to defend -- win or lose.

In short, if you don't think it is valuable enough to spend more than $100 on this, then just go with a well-known permissive open source license like MIT. If it takes off, you get famous and can command a high salary somewhere.

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#36

Post by spieglt »

dovyski wrote: post #34
spieglt wrote: post #11

I was just worrying last night that I've released my side project too early, so glad to hear someone encouraging imperfect-but-usable releases. If anyone has advice on finding users, testers, and contributors besides posting on Show HN, please let me know. https://github.com/spieglt/flyingcarpet

Awesome, project! I can't even count how many times I needed something precisely like FlyingCarpet. Please spread the word about your project.

Please help me! I'm trying but I've gotten next to 0 feedback so far. If you have two laptops will you test it and let me know what your experience was?

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#37

Post by spieglt »

jehna1 wrote: post #13
spieglt wrote: post #11

I was just worrying last night that I've released my side project too early, so glad to hear someone encouraging imperfect-but-usable releases. If anyone has advice on finding users, testers, and contributors besides posting on Show HN, please let me know. https://github.com/spieglt/flyingcarpet

Wow, cool project! You should try Reddit. It has a lot of niche communities where you could share your project. Also Google for things someone who seeks for a project like yours would Google. That gives you a rough idea of what kind of sources people use to find tools like yours. Also some directories list specific tools (like "awesome" lists of github). Try listing your project there. Or even starting your own "awes…

Thanks! Any specific subreddit recommendations besides r/golang?

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#38

Post by icebraining »

sudhirj wrote: post #33
bluGill wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AGPL doens't force bushiness to buy a license. They can use your code at no cost and modify at will so long as they make their changes available AGPL. What you want is dual license. First is AGPL: you accept that some companies will use the free code - get over it. Second is a non-open source license: your lawyers write it, those who buy this license don't have to share changes (which could be made by you or them). T…

> AGPL doens't force bushiness to buy a license. They can use your code at no cost and modify at will so long as they make their changes available AGPL. Because the AGPL counts network access as distribution, it would force businesses to open source their private codebases that communicated with my service - which is enough of deterrent to freeloading for me.

Because the AGPL counts network access as distribution, it would force businesses to open source their private codebases that communicated with my service

I don't think so. It only forces you to distribute the source of their copy of your service to any network users.

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#39

Post by jehna1 »

spieglt wrote: post #37
jehna1 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, cool project! You should try Reddit. It has a lot of niche communities where you could share your project. Also Google for things someone who seeks for a project like yours would Google. That gives you a rough idea of what kind of sources people use to find tools like yours. Also some directories list specific tools (like "awesome" lists of github). Try listing your project there. Or even starting your own "awes…

Thanks! Any specific subreddit recommendations besides r/golang?

Try product-specific subreddits like /r/coolgithubprojects

There are other subreddits too which are trying to find cool projects like yours.

Other approach is to write a blog post and post that to e.g. /r/opensource

Re: Turning a side project into an open-source project

#40

Post by z3t4 »

vtange wrote: post #23
z3t4 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you don't mind a hostile take-over don't make it too permissive though. GPL is a good license if you want good protection while still allowing people to fork, share and profit on your work.

Are there any stories/examples of MIT-licensed projects being subject to hostile take-overs? Also if it's you are the originator of a project what's stopping you from using the GPL license but not disclosing your own source while you commercialize?

For example xamarin's fork of Cocos2D.

Or companies adding closed source features to open source software. You can't do that with GPL unless you own all the code.

The classic business plan for software is to charge per license/copy. But if you release your software for free, you have to sell something else. And anyone who come up with a good solution for this will be the next unicorn.

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