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I have been an open source and free software advocate most of my life. I …
Join the DZone community and get the full member experience. I have been an open source and free software advocate most of my life. I don’t care too much about the philosophical differences between free software and open source software. For me it’s a matter of code quality. In such a regard, I agree with Linus. It’s the only way I know about that allows me to create great software Open source, even when only contributed to by a single individual, results in a position where the administrator of the project becomes forced to deliver brilliant code. Nobody wants their dirty laundry to be seen by the entire world, so when the laundry basket is on the village square, inevitably it tends to end up empty over time. However, if we assume open source delivers better code, we’re still left with the problem of paying our bills, and creating a sustainable business model from our code. How do we do this…? We’re giving away the filet mignon for free, but we’re charging for the sauce The above is an analogy I tend to resort to when people without knowledge about open source asks me how I intend to earn money from my little venture. Most people enjoys a good meal at a restaurant, even though we can create the same meal at home for half the price. The reasons are because we don’t have to do the dishes, we get served by a polite waiter, and the restaurant might have a beautiful view allowing us to escape our own lives for a brief moment. It’s really that simple for a software company too. Most people reading this can probably easily register a Droplet at DigitalOcean for $5 per month, install WordPress on it, and make it run in a couple of hours. However, if you register an account at WordPress. Com, you don’t have to worry about DOS attacks, you don’t have to worry about backups of your database, you don’t have to administrate your own Linux distro, and you don’t have to mess around with DNS records – So when I help friends to setup a website, I tell them to go to and register an account at WordPress and follow the wizards.
