[plug] Sobering read on the reality of open source software development

[Chris Caston]

On Wed, Mar 23, 2022 at 10:48 AM Chris McCormick <chris at mccormick.cx> wrote:

>
>
> Some different ways to make money if you use a FLOSS license:
>
> * Lobby the companies that use your software for donations or patronage.
> * Ask users for donations or patronage.
> * Charge for binaries, or hosting fees.
> * Charge for services.
> * Sell associated merchandise.
> * Sell educational materials and courses.
> * Put ads on the website or product.
> * Sell a book about the software.
> * Use a dual license for commercial users.
> * Charge consulting fees or premium support.
> * Sell plugins or enhancements.
> * Use a proprietary license instead.
>
> Free Software is a gift. You can't take it back just because you don't
> like one of the recipients.
>
> https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.en.html
>
>
> Cheers,
>
> Chris.
>
> --
>
>

I have been a self-employed call-out computer technician throughout the
years and I have also been active with using Linux and open source
software. I have also worked for MSPs and on contracts for corporate
environments that are balls deep in MS software and services. In recent
years I have started upskilling to fullstack web development. I have come
back to my business and want to work on establishing an open source MSP
feeling the time may finally be right for open source.

I have come up against some of the same old resistance from customers that
kind of want the Microsoft office suite for the Libreoffice price. It
doesn't help that Libreoffice still has some UX issues for end users and
they can't "find their documents" because MS Office had some way of
allowing them to access them without actually knowing where they are saved
on their drive.

The customers just don't understand the new pricing model for Microsoft
365. They think the basic plan gives them the full office suite when they
only had the web based versions and exchange online. Their Outlook 2010 had
stopped working with Exchange Online. If they move to the next plan up they
get the desktop programs but their exchange online stops working. They
wanted me to handle all this for them without spending any money but still
using Microsoft products. They also e-mail customers using copy and pasted
word templates. I wrote a PHP web app that produces very clean HTML (that
took some time to get it compatible with most e-mal clients) and used an
array of base 64 encoded images to produce the top image and signature logo
instead of their current unwitting VML. The result was beautiful but the
manager doesn't want to use it leaving their sole employee without any
automation that would make their job easier.

I can remember once over a decade ago that a user was using the Microsoft
Works suite which was a cheaper version of Office. It wouldn't run. I
thought that OpenOffice.oef would easily beat this but the user wasn't
happy. They said I had given them a dodgy solution. This was a bit of a
kick in the face as I had gone out of my way to recover their data on DDS4
tapes even though I didn't own any of the required equipment.

Having said that, whenever I built a machine for customers I always
installed (or used an image with OpenOffice.org) but I was avoiding having
the conversation and communicating with the customer about open source
software. I was too busy being a tech. I would feel exasperated when they
wanted Microsoft office but didn't want to pay for it. They wanted MS
Office for the openoffice.org price.

Now that I am a bit older and wiser and supposed to be more responsible and
that I want to focus on building an open source MSP (serving small
businesses) I need to do this whole thing better.

All of those customers I have openoffice.org and other open source programs
have never made a contribution to the various foundations. If they did then
those programs would have had more funding to further improve the UX for
the end users.

So I am considering doing the following. Making provision of the software
conditional upon making a contribution to the organisation behind the
software be it the mozilla foundation, canalogical or so on. Calling it
"funded open source" for example:

* Install Ubuntu desktop $50 donation to canalogical (good for the life of
the LTS release)
* Ubuntu server $100 donation
* Deploy and setup Thunderbird $20 donation fo the Mozilla foundation
* Deploy Raspberry Pi IoT device - $10 donation to Raspberry Pi foundation
* Install Libreoffice - $30 donation to the Document foundation
* Something similar for docker and K8's containers. This would be harder to
communicate to users as they are not desktop apps that face them directly
but it still should be done.

This is seperate from charging the customer for billable hour break-fix
services or support contracts. The money goes to supproting the foundation
that in turn pays core developers to improve the software for the users.

Yes, there would still be a lot of interia to overcome from users that are
very stubborn about wanting Microsoft but I would produce materials to
clearly communicate what the programs are and what they can do for their
business. Only once the donation has been made will the software be
provisioned. It may be demonstrated to them on a laptop, presentation or
virtual machine first before it is installed but the donation is
non-refundable. This helps ensure the user understands what they are
getting. Ideally the user feels more like an empowered buyer of open source
services rather than being forced into a "second rate" alternative.

best regards,

Christopher Caston
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