[futo.org. Bringing control of computing back to the people]
they develop some apps and other stuff that focus on open-sourche, privacy, etc.
why is futo.org not recommended in tool or guide suggestion list?
It should be noted they’ve directly supported many projects such as Signal, Tor, GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, microG, and my DivestOS: Legendary Grants - FUTO
Grant aside: having spoken to them personally, they seem pretty cool.
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Most of their products (at least Grayjay) are only source-availble and not open-source. Rosmann explained that this was to prevent crappy forks with ads, tracking,etc. But his license basically only allows for personal modification. That being said, some of it’s products are being discussed in https://discuss.privacyguides.net/tags/c/site-development/suggestions
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Theoretically it will be open-source at some point as part of the 3 pledges they have states that all Futo-funded projects are expected to be open source or to develop a plan to eventually become open source. How long that plan will take is a different question.
@Encounter5729 That page doesn’t exist
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https://futo.org/about/futo-statement-on-opensource/
Changes have been made to their license of choice, and I think they are now as “open source” as they ever will be.
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Honestly, that doesn’t sound bad to me. You can access, read, and modify the source code for your own personal versions and even redistribute it for free. The only restriction I’m seeing is that if you want to monetize “Source First” programs then you have to get the permission of the license holder/author of the program. Is there really any objectionable aspect to this model that I’m not aware of? Should people be able to just use other people’s software without compensating them for it in some way?
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A sizeable chunk of the open-source community would say, yes, that is not just permissable but desirable, and a net positive. On the other hand many would see this as unfair or unideal. I’m somewhat sympathetic towards both perspectives and don’t have a strong opinion of my own (though I lean towards the FOSS side).
Rossman, isn’t quite creating a strawman, but imo he is framing things in a way that is implicitly sympathetic towards his argument (by using very black and white examples like Google/Youtube and the “if you are going to make 10 million off our software.” Framing it this way sidesteps the ethical and practical complexity I think. Three open questions come to mind:
- Software isn’t developed in a vacuum. Futo is concerned with others making money off of their software without compensating them (a valid concern), but how will Futo compensate the dozens or hundreds of upstream open source projects that they rely on and are building their products on top of. If they commercially benefit from a bunch of upstream FOSS projects, it doesn’t seem completely fair to prevent potential downstream FOSS projects from benefiting in the same way off of their software. How can this be addressed or reconciled?
- easy to say someone making 10 million should pay, but that is an arbitrarily high number (unless that is explicitly stated in the terms). Where and how to draw the line?
- What effect will this have on innovation and collaboration? To what extent does constraining the ways in which derivative projects can use the software stifle innovation and improvements.
I think the problems Futo is trying to solve are real and important problems. I think they are for the most part earnest in their arguments and goals. I think experimentation with business models and liences is okay. But I’m not sure how comfortable I am with the approach they are taking, and I’m not yet convinced it is completely ethically coherent (see #1 above) or better than the status quo. Still, I’m supportive of their right to try something different with their own projects).
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They could do the same thing. They pay upsteam for the core and take a cut themselves… It will have to come down to agreements between parties to be feasible. Think that that will be fine.
Honestly we could also view it in another way. If open-source and proprietary were the two only choices, then they might have chosen close-source*. Here we at least have the security benefits of OSS.
*Because very few can make money with open source. Most examples where OSS companies do make money is when some cloud storage is needed (Ente, Proton Drive, Cryptee, etc) or freemium model (Bitwarden, Proton Pass).
Futo is concerned with others making money off of their software without compensating them (a valid concern)
Has there ever been a good solution to this paradox? I am aware of a few approaches but none of them free of controversy:
- The “Red Hat Enterprise Linux” loophole: you can get the source code if you’re a paying customer, and as per the GPL terms you’re free to share the source code, but if you actually it we’ll reserve the right to cancel your support agreement and you won’t get any more updates. Have fun migrating your server to another distribution! This only makes sense for products where you enter into a paid service contract, so not for Futo.
- The SSPL license: Like the AGPL but with the difference that if you host SSPL-licensed software to offer a service, you have to open source everything on your server that’s used to run that service. In practice, no company will want to do that. However, the OSI and FSF haven’t approved it as “free”.
- The AGPL+NІGGER license. Extends the normal AGPL license by the requirement to include the N-word in the license text, which basically means that most (Western) companies would be spooked and not use the software because they don’t want a taboo word in their repo. I don’t need to elaborate why it’s controversial and rarely used.
- The Futo license, above. Like the SSPL, it’s not deemed “free”.
I really wish there was a clean solution to this problem.
This isn’t a paradox. The framing is wrong. If a hammer won’t chop wood, don’t blame hammer. In short, FOSS isn’t a business model unto itself. It is perhaps useful as go-to-market and for marketing (distribution), doubly so for developer tools upstarts.
Their licensing isn’t great for long-term survivability of a project, but full source transparency is still good. I’d use their stuff if there are no decent actual free alternatives available. In terms of principles and what they are doing, I appreciate their work.
There is also the Business source license. I like it, because at first its a source available license with as few or many restrictions as thr owner want, and then after a specofic date, the source cide change to a different open source licence.
Example, sentry is a automated bug reporting services. It offer all its source code woth BSL woth the restriction that the owner cannot use it to release a competing product. Software released on 2024-06 are marked as changing licence to GPL in 2027.
Therefore, it’s eventually open source.
Edit - strange, they might have changed license to someting else recently.
I’ve been thinking about this. I pay for my free software, but the truth is very few people do.
The most common way is to provide your software as a service if possible. Web services (or other services) are the only real way to make a profit developing software these days if you’re not an incumbent. It’s much, much harder if you’re developing something like an NLE.
If you’re not developing a service, you’re left with inconveniencing users who don’t pay. For example, only provide builds to paying users like Ardour does and make everyone else compile it. Linux users get off easy. Or only provide older versions of your software for free.
This doesn’t work at all if you’re only developing software for Linux because you want to use something like Flatpak as a distribution method. Flathub doesn’t provide monetization strategies (yet), so people will just download your software for free.
There’s no point implementing DRM because the sources can just be altered and re-compiled, and if people like your software enough, they’ll fork it.
I think the best way would be through Flathub. Ask users to pay, and GNOME Software/KDE Discover/other clients can implement payment features. ElementaryOS does this from my understanding.
But that’s a far-flung goal and relies on upstream.
There is no reliable way. I don’t think any of these methods are good. I think the best way to make money with free software is to nag and guilt users with a donation banner. It worked for WinRAR and it worked for Thunderbird. It’s not the sort of thing people will patch out.
I like Drew DeVault’s articles:
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