> From: Calum Galleitch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: Thu, 3 Jul 2003 20:03:01 +0000 > > That doesn't mean that all software should be made Free. Your > software is unique, as far as I know, in coming as close to a freehand > notation package as possible. I don't think there's anything else > with your focus. In turn, that means there isn't all that many folk > that need exactly what you provide (but the folks like Willie > Donaldson who do, really do). So charge them for it. And when you're > retired, and you're looking at spending your time in a rocking chair, > whack a GPL on it and bask in the knowledge that people are > benefitting from your generosity. In the meantime, earn your living.
Another angle is the business model that a former employer of mine (Cygnus Solutions) used. Cygnus sold commercial-grade support and development for free software. They got bought by Red Hat in 2000, but up to that point, they were best known for their support of gcc (the Gnu C Compiler). The way this worked was that customers would purchase Cygnus's support for gcc, which meant that they would get a version from our CVS tree, which we would be expected to support and provide bug fixes, on the time scale that companies expect for commercial software. Cygnus shipped the compiler with source code, which was freely modifiable and distributable (under the GPL). Customers could also hire Cygnus to add specific features or optimizations that they needed, again with development to be done on the time scale that companies expect for commercial software. Cygnus contributed all of its code back to the FSF on a more-or-less quarterly basis, so the open source community did eventually reap the benefits of the work that Cygnus did. Again, this is not to say that all software has to be free, only that there are companies that have succeeded in making money from free software. Jeff To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
