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This model should be done more. Develop the product in the open, offer a fully functional open source version, and then offer a paid version on commercial app s
by zquestz 3y ago
This model should be done more. Develop the product in the open, offer a fully functional open source version, and then offer a paid version on commercial app stores.
This can bring in some extra revenue for the project, plus covers the app store dev work.
I bet a bunch of users would buy it just to support the dev team. Plus I would argue an app store purchase (one click) can be done faster/easier than any donation flow I have seen for an open-source project.
Just something to think about.
- mekster 3y agoAlways loved the model in MacOS that developers charge a small one time fee, usually in the range of $5 - $20 to support them to build relatively good apps pushing the overall quality of the third party app ecosystem instead of either crappy free or corporate built big/slow/expensive mess on other platforms.
- zquestz 3y agoI was one of those devs long ago. The shareware model worked wonders.
- JCharante 3y agoAnki has a similar ish model. Free on desktop and web, a community made Android app compatible with the free cloud saving, and a paid iOS app by the team. If you can’t afford the iOS app you can use the web version.
- ncruces 3y agoAnd when that's not enough to cover the yearly $100 fee, and Apple makes it purposely difficult to ship compiled binaries in any other way, you get no (niche) OSS software on the platform.
- paulryanrogers 3y agoAnd the cost of Mac hardware to build on, unless you want to rent an online env.