Forgive me but this part of the open source and foss confuses me. If you code and release an open source and free piece of software like say, a robust video player such as VLC, how is that dev being paid?

Because in my eyes (I’m not too privy to FOSS ins and outs)

I’m basically getting your software for free of no charge, it IS free as in free beer cos you’re not asking ME to pay it for so who is paying YOU?

Does it come via donations or wealthy corporations like Red Hat and Microsoft pay or fund open sourced projects that is given to the hard working developers of that OSS/FOSS project?

  • kubok
    14•3 months ago

    Core developer of an open source software suite here. We make money by doing the following things:

    • We offer a free and open source community package that has the basics. However, we offer a number of professional packages that we offer yearly subscriptions for.
    • We host our software. We charge by the number of active users.
    • Custom development.
    • Paid support like migrations or troubleshooting. Also helping external developers develop custom modules.

    This allows us enough income to develop the community part of the software.

    • @trolololol
      6•3 months ago

      Correct but also worth mentioning that most projects and people don’t reach any meaningful scale to generate income or even pay self running costs.

      I don’t think most people havr money as a goal when they come up with an idea and start an open source project. It’s more likely they want to try a new tech or are just passionate about the idea. Like entrepreneurs, but not capitalistic.

      Like start up unicorns, it’s a small percentage that gets to grow to epic propositions.