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Forgive me, but I don't understand the distinction here. I tried build software that cost money to run, and I had a horde of people telling me its not open source but rather "source available" because the license specified that a 20% fee needed to be paid.

I don't know of any license that is widely accepted as FOSS which also requires that the developer get paid when the software is used.



Tell the horde OSS != FOSS and also get off their entitlement horse.

By opening your source you’re already in the minority contributing to common good, openly sharing your understanding of how to solve problems with code (aka IP). Making IP free is a big deal — you’re making it free to learn, understand, and advance shared knowledge. You don’t owe anyone making it free to run a business on.

To head off an AWS vs. Elastic situation, where someone else offers your code as a paid service w/o compensating you and w/o releasing their in-house patches (https://www.theregister.com/2021/01/22/aws_elastic_fork/), consider AGPLv3: https://choosealicense.com/licenses/agpl-3.0/

See top comment on that here on HN about 8 months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25834523

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TL;DR: “How to charge for OSS”: https://www.mikeperham.com/2015/11/23/how-to-charge-for-your...




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