6 ms·

I will now charge my clients a fee to support open source projects

126 points by gilad 7y ago

derekp7 7y ago
The problem is that enterprises have one mechanism to purchase software, and a totally separate mechanism for charitable donations. The two budgets are run by separate groups, and never interact. The solution? Offer your code under an open source license, but also have a purchase option to buy a commercial license. In many cases, the commercial version is a compiled and validated official executable, available with a support contract. But there is no reason that the came code can't be made available under both licenses, or that the commercial license can't actually be the same GPL (or whatever) license the open source one is offered under. This way, the technical team that chooses the software has an invoice that they can send to purchasing, to get corporate support dollars to the open source project.
- chii 7y ago
  Then the bean counters say "why are you buying this software, when you could have gotten it for free." "what do you mean it's like donating to a charity? we already have a corporate social responsibility budget, and it's spent on XYZ. We don't need to donate anymore".
  - Spooky23 7y ago
    You use a license that’s hard for corporate counsel to accept like GPL3.
    - devoply 7y ago
      Affero GPL 3 :)
      - StudentStuff 7y ago
        If a company can't stomach AGPLv3, then they shouldn't be using software I write. I seek contributions back, while not leaving a gaping hole for SaaS vendors to extend & close my codebase.
    - dotancohen 7y ago
      That is quite the polemic statement, especially if the company is using the software internally (like VIM) and not building their product with it (like Python).
  - zrm 7y ago
    > Then the bean counters say "why are you buying this software, when you could have gotten it for free." Because it's the "officially supported" version and companies don't like running software that isn't eligible for official support.
    - stubish 7y ago
      It is also required by various certifications to purchase support when the option is available.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - elygre 7y ago
    Ask them why they don’t buy DIY-kits for furniture, or assemble computers from individual parts.
    - Nullabillity 7y ago
      My old company had a ton of IKEA furniture, didn't seem to be an issue.
  - maccard 7y ago
    In my experience purchasing teams are more likely to say "why did you get this for free when you could have gotten an officially supported version?" (Ignoring the fact they probably wouldn't have approved if I had)
  - jedberg 7y ago
    PyCharm has two licenses, one called Personal and one Corporate. The corporate one costs more, and the only difference between them is the corporate one lets you use it in a corporate setting. The open source project could do the same thing -- free for personal use (including code!) and $X for corporate use (including code!).
    - yrro 7y ago
      Then it won't be open source any more.
      - DocTomoe 7y ago
        Ah, the good old RMS / ESR debate. Open Source means just that: that the source is open and available. You are thinking about "free software" > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html.en https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
        nybble41 7y ago
        Open Source means that the license meets the Open Source Definition[1]. That includes "No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor ... For example, it may not restrict the program from being used in a business...". What you're describing is sometimes referred to as a "source available" license, which is a much lower standard. [1] https://opensource.org/osd https://opensource.org/osd
        bonzini 7y ago
        Not according to OSI, discrimination for personal vs. corporate use is not allowed by the Open Source Definition.
  - rusticpenn 7y ago
    Its easier to buy products so get some certifications, Higher prio for change requests or feature requests etc..
- nirui 7y ago
  > The solution? Offer your code under an open source license, but also have a purchase option to buy a commercial license There is one problem though, when you put a commercial license to your software, it effectively make you a software seller and thus maybe facing associated legal issues and responsibilities (provide user support, pay tax for example). And sometime, those responsibilities can be a huge trouble.
  - prepend 7y ago
    Yes, this is true, but in order to make revenue as a software developer, I don’t think this can be avoided. OSS does not have the legal contracted support that commercial software does. The upside of selling license is that some of that money can be used to buy insurance and taxes and whatnot. I don’t think there’s a way to get paid for OSS work directly without these responsibilities. Even if there’s a tip jar, there is an expectation of support and some warranty.
- chithanh 7y ago
  > The problem is that enterprises have one mechanism to purchase software, and a totally separate mechanism for charitable donations. And there is paid membership in business associations. That is closer to the purchasing department than to the donation department. It really is a no-brainer: If there is an organization/foundation which supports the project, the enterprise could just join that, and may in turn even receive voting rights on the future direction of the project. No need to make complex schemes to work around being unable to donate, or try to sell open source code.
  - londons_explore 7y ago
    Provide all options. Corporate policies are often so rigid, and it's so easy to set up a PayPal button and a "members mailing list", that you might as well.
peterwwillis 7y ago
The most amusing thing about companies' technology budgets is their fear of price tags. Pay for Enterprise support for that open source product? Way too expensive, no way. Pay for 5 engineers in completely separate teams to badly implement, partially support, and later replace part of the Enterprise features as proprietary extensions over 2-3 years, while company's actual product languishes without the functionality it could have used? Take my money. Meanwhile, keep paying for SaaS and proprietary software, because there's no alternative, supposedly.
- brianberns 7y ago
  It's because the engineers are on staff and you're paying them anyway. Trying to justify a separate purchase, even if would be cheaper on paper, is way harder.
  - dotancohen 7y ago
    That, and NIH. I've literally last week told my project manager that the better business decision would be to buy the very software that I'm developing. There is more than enough work for me to do already. But the broader picture requires us to develop in-house. I don't mind, I'm learning something new. I suppose that in itself adds value to the company.
    - peterwwillis 7y ago
      > I don't mind, I'm learning something new. I suppose that in itself adds value to the company. It would if the information got imbued back into the rest of the company, but it most often manifests as domain experts, who when they go away, someone else has to learn the thing all over again.
swalsh 7y ago
I've never been to church, except for the occasional funeral. So i'm not really familiar with how collection plates or tithes work. But maybe the church of open source could find a priest to get some advice. Or at the very least, lecture people about how much better a person you can be for supporting open source.
- AmericanChopper 7y ago
  > So i'm not really familiar with how collection plates or tithes work. They tend to have a service provider handle the processing for them. Most decent sized churches will have their own mobile apps too.
- pricechild 7y ago
  ESR is making an attempt: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=8387 http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=8387
  - dotancohen 7y ago
    So is the developer of Zig, in response to the whole V language fiasco. https://andrewkelley.me/post/why-donating-to-musl-libc-project.html https://andrewkelley.me/post/why-donating-to-musl-libc-proje...
revskill 7y ago
Imagine from the beginning of github, you do that, then OSS will die from day 1. I'm sure it's not the right way to make OSS sustainable. The only way (which i believe) to make OSS sustainable, is that, you open source the core or toolings, let others fork it, and you make contract to support enterprise clients, to support the open core.
- doesnt_know 7y ago
  FLOSS existed before Github and it will exist long after it is gone. Financial sustainability has always been a problem for the movement but it's independent of a single repository host.
- NationOfJoe 7y ago
  why do you think that would have killed OSS from day 1? do you think people would only continue if the make some cash right away? i feel like most smaller maintainers do it for fun/cool factor and if they get something from it then its a bonus. i guess we could look at youTube as a model there, i think most creators start out doing something they love and only turn into a business when they see it can be sustainable, they have no shortage of creators
rahimiali 7y ago
specifically: "I will ask my clients for an hourly rate that is 1 Euro higher than I originally negotiated or I would usually charge. I will take that money (up to ~160 Euros per month) and support those projects on Open Collective that I'm basing my work upon in my client's project."
acconrad 7y ago
This seems like a bad PR move. Having been in consulting everything is about perception of value. Why not just plan to spend some of your money (say 5%) on supporting open source projects and just raise your rates by 5%? Ticketmaster is the perfect example of this. You buy a concert ticket for $35, but after all of their exorbitant bullshit fees, it's more like $50-55. But if they just told you "$50 is what you pay" then you'd probably not care at all. So go ahead and charge whatever you want for a fee. Just don't penalize your customers for the things you want to personally support.
- chii 7y ago
  My guess is that by itemizing the open-source donation, the higher fees (compared to your competition's) is justified. If you just raised your price by X%, you are now more expensive relative to your competitor's (and they don't donate, so thus out-competing you).
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
masonic 7y ago
I hope the writer puts some of those proceeds toward a proofreader.
mjl- 7y ago
to which projects do you donate? the ones you used in your paid work? the ones you wish would improve? the ones which need it most?
- jbrooksuk 7y ago
  Could you imagine donating to everyone in `node_modules`?
hokus 7y ago
Its not my area of expertise but.... There are so many corrupt non-profits to which one can make tax deductible donations. Would it be possible to reform/tweak/hack the [existing] donations to help their bottom line? I bet someone out there is already doing this.
kirankn 7y ago
Like the idea !
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
jnpaw 7y ago
https://twitter.com/adamrackis/status/931195056479965185 https://twitter.com/adamrackis/status/931195056479965185 If you think your software is valuable enough to cost money (instead of offering it for free) then do so.
vbsteven 7y ago
I wonder if some sort of structure can be used where you split the invoice in two separate invoices. One for the work and a smaller one for the open source donation that can be deducted from taxes as an actual donation. It might not be legal because of tax evasion.
- abdullahkhalids 7y ago
  If Walmart can ask you for a dollar charity on your bill, so can some independent contractor.
NetOpWibby 7y ago
The comments on that article are better than the article itself.

126 points by gilad 7y ago

The problem is that enterprises have one mechanism to purchase software, and a totally separate mechanism for charitable donations. The two budgets are run by separate groups, and never interact. The solution? Offer your code under an open source license, but also have a purchase option to buy a commercial license. In many cases, the commercial version is a compiled and validated official executable, available with a support contract. But there is no reason that the came code can't be made available under both licenses, or that the commercial license can't actually be the same GPL (or whatever) license the open source one is offered under. This way, the technical team that chooses the software has an invoice that they can send to purchasing, to get corporate support dollars to the open source project.

chii 7y ago
Then the bean counters say "why are you buying this software, when you could have gotten it for free." "what do you mean it's like donating to a charity? we already have a corporate social responsibility budget, and it's spent on XYZ. We don't need to donate anymore".
- Spooky23 7y ago
  You use a license that’s hard for corporate counsel to accept like GPL3.
  - devoply 7y ago
    Affero GPL 3 :)
    - StudentStuff 7y ago
      If a company can't stomach AGPLv3, then they shouldn't be using software I write. I seek contributions back, while not leaving a gaping hole for SaaS vendors to extend & close my codebase.
  - dotancohen 7y ago
    That is quite the polemic statement, especially if the company is using the software internally (like VIM) and not building their product with it (like Python).
- zrm 7y ago
  > Then the bean counters say "why are you buying this software, when you could have gotten it for free." Because it's the "officially supported" version and companies don't like running software that isn't eligible for official support.
  - stubish 7y ago
    It is also required by various certifications to purchase support when the option is available.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- elygre 7y ago
  Ask them why they don’t buy DIY-kits for furniture, or assemble computers from individual parts.
  - Nullabillity 7y ago
    My old company had a ton of IKEA furniture, didn't seem to be an issue.
- maccard 7y ago
  In my experience purchasing teams are more likely to say "why did you get this for free when you could have gotten an officially supported version?" (Ignoring the fact they probably wouldn't have approved if I had)
- jedberg 7y ago
  PyCharm has two licenses, one called Personal and one Corporate. The corporate one costs more, and the only difference between them is the corporate one lets you use it in a corporate setting. The open source project could do the same thing -- free for personal use (including code!) and $X for corporate use (including code!).
  - yrro 7y ago
    Then it won't be open source any more.
    - DocTomoe 7y ago
      Ah, the good old RMS / ESR debate. Open Source means just that: that the source is open and available. You are thinking about "free software" > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html.en https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
      - nybble41 7y ago
        Open Source means that the license meets the Open Source Definition[1]. That includes "No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor ... For example, it may not restrict the program from being used in a business...". What you're describing is sometimes referred to as a "source available" license, which is a much lower standard. [1] https://opensource.org/osd https://opensource.org/osd
      - bonzini 7y ago
        Not according to OSI, discrimination for personal vs. corporate use is not allowed by the Open Source Definition.
- rusticpenn 7y ago
  Its easier to buy products so get some certifications, Higher prio for change requests or feature requests etc..
nirui 7y ago
> The solution? Offer your code under an open source license, but also have a purchase option to buy a commercial license There is one problem though, when you put a commercial license to your software, it effectively make you a software seller and thus maybe facing associated legal issues and responsibilities (provide user support, pay tax for example). And sometime, those responsibilities can be a huge trouble.
- prepend 7y ago
  Yes, this is true, but in order to make revenue as a software developer, I don’t think this can be avoided. OSS does not have the legal contracted support that commercial software does. The upside of selling license is that some of that money can be used to buy insurance and taxes and whatnot. I don’t think there’s a way to get paid for OSS work directly without these responsibilities. Even if there’s a tip jar, there is an expectation of support and some warranty.
chithanh 7y ago
> The problem is that enterprises have one mechanism to purchase software, and a totally separate mechanism for charitable donations. And there is paid membership in business associations. That is closer to the purchasing department than to the donation department. It really is a no-brainer: If there is an organization/foundation which supports the project, the enterprise could just join that, and may in turn even receive voting rights on the future direction of the project. No need to make complex schemes to work around being unable to donate, or try to sell open source code.
- londons_explore 7y ago
  Provide all options. Corporate policies are often so rigid, and it's so easy to set up a PayPal button and a "members mailing list", that you might as well.

peterwwillis 7y ago

The most amusing thing about companies' technology budgets is their fear of price tags. Pay for Enterprise support for that open source product? Way too expensive, no way. Pay for 5 engineers in completely separate teams to badly implement, partially support, and later replace part of the Enterprise features as proprietary extensions over 2-3 years, while company's actual product languishes without the functionality it could have used? Take my money. Meanwhile, keep paying for SaaS and proprietary software, because there's no alternative, supposedly.

brianberns 7y ago
It's because the engineers are on staff and you're paying them anyway. Trying to justify a separate purchase, even if would be cheaper on paper, is way harder.
- dotancohen 7y ago
  That, and NIH. I've literally last week told my project manager that the better business decision would be to buy the very software that I'm developing. There is more than enough work for me to do already. But the broader picture requires us to develop in-house. I don't mind, I'm learning something new. I suppose that in itself adds value to the company.
  - peterwwillis 7y ago
    > I don't mind, I'm learning something new. I suppose that in itself adds value to the company. It would if the information got imbued back into the rest of the company, but it most often manifests as domain experts, who when they go away, someone else has to learn the thing all over again.

swalsh 7y ago

I've never been to church, except for the occasional funeral. So i'm not really familiar with how collection plates or tithes work. But maybe the church of open source could find a priest to get some advice. Or at the very least, lecture people about how much better a person you can be for supporting open source.

AmericanChopper 7y ago
> So i'm not really familiar with how collection plates or tithes work. They tend to have a service provider handle the processing for them. Most decent sized churches will have their own mobile apps too.
pricechild 7y ago
ESR is making an attempt: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=8387 http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=8387
- dotancohen 7y ago
  So is the developer of Zig, in response to the whole V language fiasco. https://andrewkelley.me/post/why-donating-to-musl-libc-project.html https://andrewkelley.me/post/why-donating-to-musl-libc-proje...

revskill 7y ago

Imagine from the beginning of github, you do that, then OSS will die from day 1. I'm sure it's not the right way to make OSS sustainable. The only way (which i believe) to make OSS sustainable, is that, you open source the core or toolings, let others fork it, and you make contract to support enterprise clients, to support the open core.

doesnt_know 7y ago
FLOSS existed before Github and it will exist long after it is gone. Financial sustainability has always been a problem for the movement but it's independent of a single repository host.
NationOfJoe 7y ago
why do you think that would have killed OSS from day 1? do you think people would only continue if the make some cash right away? i feel like most smaller maintainers do it for fun/cool factor and if they get something from it then its a bonus. i guess we could look at youTube as a model there, i think most creators start out doing something they love and only turn into a business when they see it can be sustainable, they have no shortage of creators

rahimiali 7y ago

specifically: "I will ask my clients for an hourly rate that is 1 Euro higher than I originally negotiated or I would usually charge. I will take that money (up to ~160 Euros per month) and support those projects on Open Collective that I'm basing my work upon in my client's project."

acconrad 7y ago

This seems like a bad PR move. Having been in consulting everything is about perception of value. Why not just plan to spend some of your money (say 5%) on supporting open source projects and just raise your rates by 5%? Ticketmaster is the perfect example of this. You buy a concert ticket for $35, but after all of their exorbitant bullshit fees, it's more like $50-55. But if they just told you "$50 is what you pay" then you'd probably not care at all. So go ahead and charge whatever you want for a fee. Just don't penalize your customers for the things you want to personally support.

chii 7y ago
My guess is that by itemizing the open-source donation, the higher fees (compared to your competition's) is justified. If you just raised your price by X%, you are now more expensive relative to your competitor's (and they don't donate, so thus out-competing you).

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

masonic 7y ago

I hope the writer puts some of those proceeds toward a proofreader.

mjl- 7y ago

to which projects do you donate? the ones you used in your paid work? the ones you wish would improve? the ones which need it most?

jbrooksuk 7y ago
Could you imagine donating to everyone in `node_modules`?

hokus 7y ago

Its not my area of expertise but.... There are so many corrupt non-profits to which one can make tax deductible donations. Would it be possible to reform/tweak/hack the [existing] donations to help their bottom line? I bet someone out there is already doing this.

kirankn 7y ago

Like the idea !

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

jnpaw 7y ago

https://twitter.com/adamrackis/status/931195056479965185 https://twitter.com/adamrackis/status/931195056479965185 If you think your software is valuable enough to cost money (instead of offering it for free) then do so.

vbsteven 7y ago

I wonder if some sort of structure can be used where you split the invoice in two separate invoices. One for the work and a smaller one for the open source donation that can be deducted from taxes as an actual donation. It might not be legal because of tax evasion.

abdullahkhalids 7y ago
If Walmart can ask you for a dollar charity on your bill, so can some independent contractor.

NetOpWibby 7y ago

The comments on that article are better than the article itself.