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I've been kicking around a business plan idea for about seven years: A software marketplace for items under a GNU license. The key: I neglect to put that fact i

I've been kicking around a business plan idea for about seven years: A software marketplace for items under a GNU license. The key: I neglect to put that fact in the marketing. The full license is posted with the software download, via a pop up EULA-style window before the download proceeds complete with an "I Agree" nuisance button. The market starts with a price discovery model where I suggest a price and allow the person pay whatever they want. After some data gathering, I simply obfuscate the "pick-your-price" mechanism. Yes, this is a bit of cherry-picking, where I employ some dark patterns. My reason for this thought experiment is the crux of this article and discussion: How do you explain software in the English language for which the rights of the end user are enshrined while leaving a profit-path open for the creator? My reply is: You don't. You focus, instead, on making the process of obtaining the software as friendly and service-oriented as possible. I wonder how spectacularly this idea will fail?

45h34jh53k4j 9y ago
We have a software marketplace for items under a GNU license. # apt-get install package I would say you will fail most spectacularly, but it seems to work for RedHat Enterprise Linux
- WBrentWilliams 9y ago
  You would have a point if # apt-get required registering a credit card number. Last I checked, it does not. True, apt is a pedantically-speaking economic marketplace: a true free market. It is a free market based on ideas, usage, and popularity. It is not a market based on directly moving funds to the software creators. GNU encourages software creators to sell their software for as much money as they can make while using their license. What I am playing around with as a thought experiment is a method to create a market that trades the scarcity of a software writer's creativity for money. And yes, the attempt would probably fail spectacularly. Anyone who wants to attempt to execute on my idea is free to do so. Ideas are cheap. Execution is expensive.
- ams6110 9y ago
  With RHEL you are paying for support, not software.
  - ymse 9y ago
    Both, really. Support is included in the price, but the subscription fees for Ceph, Openshift etc are not exactly gratis. The SRPMS are typically public so you can compile them yourself, but official binaries are only available through RHEL subscription channels.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  RedHat Enterprise Linux is targeted at companies that pay for support and trainings. I bet RedHat gets nothing from home users.
avar 9y ago
Any free or open source software license does not need an EULA, and presenting it as such is antithetical to the entire idea of free software. You by definition do not need to agree to any free software license before you use the software, you can vehemently disagree with it or completely ignore its existence. The license only exists to give you extra rights you didn't already have under standard copyright law (permission to distribute the program & modify it, under certain conditions). An EULA is a dubious legal hack used by proprietary software to deprive you of rights you'd have had anyway if not for the EULA, which is the exact opposite of how free software works. Edit: A lot of people are replying to this saying I'm incorrect. I'm not. A lot of free software licenses such as the GPL v2 spell out explicitly that they have nothing to do with anything except copying/distribution or modification: > Activities other than copying, distribution > and modification are not covered by this License; > they are outside its scope.[...] The GPL v3 says the same thing in different words, and as FigBug points out downthread the general FSF license FAQ makes this clear[1]. The Open Source definition also asserts this by proxy. Licenses aren't allowed to impose any restrictions on users that they wouldn't have anyway if they had no license to the software. Really, if you use free software you can just completely ignore all the licenses and you don't need to understand or have read any of them. This is one of the beautiful things about free software that separates it from EULA-using proprietary software. Of course you need to understand the licenses if you want to distribute the software in any way, but that entirely falls under the umbrella of activity you didn't have permission for without the license, it would be copyright infringement by default. This is also why free software organizations like the FSF would as a last resort sue someone for copyright infringement, not violating the GPL (but of course adhering to the GPL would bring them back into compliance). This is different from proprietary software companies which might sue you over violations of their own made up rules, which you supposedly agreed to via the EULA. The EULA is a hack to try to apply contract law to your use of the program, whereas free software & open source licenses purely piggy-back on copyright law. All those licenses are a way to say "here's stuff we allow you to do, which you didn't have legal permission to do anyway in the absence of this license, given certain conditions" (or no conditions for e.g. the WFTPL). 1. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#NoDistributionRequirements https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#NoDistributionR...
- 9y ago

45h34jh53k4j 9y ago

We have a software marketplace for items under a GNU license. # apt-get install package I would say you will fail most spectacularly, but it seems to work for RedHat Enterprise Linux

WBrentWilliams 9y ago
You would have a point if # apt-get required registering a credit card number. Last I checked, it does not. True, apt is a pedantically-speaking economic marketplace: a true free market. It is a free market based on ideas, usage, and popularity. It is not a market based on directly moving funds to the software creators. GNU encourages software creators to sell their software for as much money as they can make while using their license. What I am playing around with as a thought experiment is a method to create a market that trades the scarcity of a software writer's creativity for money. And yes, the attempt would probably fail spectacularly. Anyone who wants to attempt to execute on my idea is free to do so. Ideas are cheap. Execution is expensive.
ams6110 9y ago
With RHEL you are paying for support, not software.
- ymse 9y ago
  Both, really. Support is included in the price, but the subscription fees for Ceph, Openshift etc are not exactly gratis. The SRPMS are typically public so you can compile them yourself, but official binaries are only available through RHEL subscription channels.
pjmlp 9y ago
RedHat Enterprise Linux is targeted at companies that pay for support and trainings. I bet RedHat gets nothing from home users.

avar 9y ago

Any free or open source software license does not need an EULA, and presenting it as such is antithetical to the entire idea of free software. You by definition do not need to agree to any free software license before you use the software, you can vehemently disagree with it or completely ignore its existence. The license only exists to give you extra rights you didn't already have under standard copyright law (permission to distribute the program & modify it, under certain conditions). An EULA is a dubious legal hack used by proprietary software to deprive you of rights you'd have had anyway if not for the EULA, which is the exact opposite of how free software works. Edit: A lot of people are replying to this saying I'm incorrect. I'm not. A lot of free software licenses such as the GPL v2 spell out explicitly that they have nothing to do with anything except copying/distribution or modification: > Activities other than copying, distribution > and modification are not covered by this License; > they are outside its scope.[...] The GPL v3 says the same thing in different words, and as FigBug points out downthread the general FSF license FAQ makes this clear[1]. The Open Source definition also asserts this by proxy. Licenses aren't allowed to impose any restrictions on users that they wouldn't have anyway if they had no license to the software. Really, if you use free software you can just completely ignore all the licenses and you don't need to understand or have read any of them. This is one of the beautiful things about free software that separates it from EULA-using proprietary software. Of course you need to understand the licenses if you want to distribute the software in any way, but that entirely falls under the umbrella of activity you didn't have permission for without the license, it would be copyright infringement by default. This is also why free software organizations like the FSF would as a last resort sue someone for copyright infringement, not violating the GPL (but of course adhering to the GPL would bring them back into compliance). This is different from proprietary software companies which might sue you over violations of their own made up rules, which you supposedly agreed to via the EULA. The EULA is a hack to try to apply contract law to your use of the program, whereas free software & open source licenses purely piggy-back on copyright law. All those licenses are a way to say "here's stuff we allow you to do, which you didn't have legal permission to do anyway in the absence of this license, given certain conditions" (or no conditions for e.g. the WFTPL). 1. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#NoDistributionRequirements https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#NoDistributionR...

9y ago