How do people make money off of free software?

How do people make money off of free software?
Inb4 support. I'm not talking about enterprise level shit but consumer software, something like a nice financial calculator program or a small game.

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i could tell you how but that would cost you some money : )

They don't.

I'd just like to interject for a moment. The term "consumer," when used to refer to the users of computing, is loaded with assumptions we should reject. Some come from the idea that using the program "consumes" the program, which leads people to impose on copiable digital works the economic conclusions that were drawn about uncopiable material products.

In addition, describing the users of software as "consumers" refers to a framing in which people are limited to selecting between whatever “products” are available in the “market.” There is no room in this framing for the idea that users can directly exercise control over what a program does.

To describe people who are not limited to passive use of works, we suggest terms such as "individuals" and "citizens," rather than "consumers."

Sell it.

>How do people make money off of free software?
they don't. that's why GPL/LGPL/etc is fucking idiotic nonsense for communists.

>propietary calculator apps make money

Do something fancy looking for a niche section, open up a Patreon for you to buy hot pockets and pay Pajeets to do the coding for you

The point is not making money. If you have a job you already have an income. A small software is something you do for yourself in your free time, maybe because all calculators lack the feature you need, or just for fun. It's not a time hog. And then you just give it to people to use it if they want. Think of a painting, or a song. You do it for fun, to show some friends. And then you just upload it, because some other people might like it.

>what is matlab
>what is mathematica

adware
pro versions

Convince your audience to be altruist instead of egotist with some beneficial factors.

Unfortunately, I have no idea what to list.

>register with appstore
>upload app
>set price
>wait until you can claim the monez

otoh it is totally bullshit they keep the scraps

They use it to pad their resumes and get real jobs working on proprietary software

This. If people you take your program without paying, they'd do it even if it was illegal to.

shit, you meant free software

you need to add ads for that

>The point is not making money. If you have a job you already have an income.
What if my job is to program?

Then you'd be getting paid by your boss, not sales.

>How do people make money off of free software?
The company I work for make hardware and a software suite that's free and open source. They sell the hardware + support + SMAs and give away the software for free.

>nb4 support. I'm not talking about enterprise level shit but consumer software, something like a nice financial calculator program or a small game.
They don't make money from this other than donations by good samaritans.

>matlab and mathematica are calculator apps

gnu.org/philosophy/selling.en.html

You can sell your software, but people can give it away for free after they buy it from you :^)

>just like every program in existence unless you blow your profits on DRM

If your job is a programmer and your programs are small calculator apps or indie games, you should consider suicide. We already have too many pajeets selling useless apps

If your job is a memer and your still making pajeet memes , you should consider suicide. We already have too many redditors shitposting

They don't. Proper FOSS is also gratis to end users.

Sell it. I have a couple of apps in the Play Store with sources on Github. If someone wants to, they can compile them by themselves.

You can additionally sell the sources too but I think that's too much work in case of Android apps.

they don't, it's a labor of love they work on in their free time

The FSF disagrees.

Add telemetry and sell the data to NASA and CIA niggers

>Then you'd be getting paid by your boss, not sales.
How is my boss gonna get paid under GPL?

What if my job is to program medium-size systems and codebases with a team of around 5-10 people? How do I get paid?

youtube.com/watch?v=fsvviop0Ax0

That's your boss's problem not yours.

Donations (Patreon, a "plz gib mone" button, etc.)
Preexisting job (or just leeching tax dollars from your local government in the form of welfare checks)
Licencing (Putting the software out for free but forcing people to pay money to use it for enterprise purposes, selling licences to even have the source code, etc.)

Other than that you don't

>How do people make money off of free software?
They can't. Never use gpl if you want to live off your work.
gpl is for side-project and cv-enhancer garbage.
Your project will ended up being forked for no reasons and will die in general indifference.

Wrong.

- Support plans.
- Paid feature requests.
- Write the program then disclose sources if sufficient money is donated.

Begging on the street.

Yup those billion dollar companies built in Linux like Amazon and Google are going to collapse any day now

>Donations (Patreon, a "plz gib mone" button, etc.)
Great. So I should be a beggar.

>Preexisting job
This is what all FSF nutjobs say... just do a different job. I should basically wait tables during the night and make the money and then program for free.

Logic of these fucking commies just baffles me.

Best projects don't even accept donations etc. instead they ask you to help them any way you can (testing, bug reports, patching, translations and so on...)

You're not looking to be a programmer, anyway. You're looking to argue, or else you'd be more specific than "a nice financial calculator program or a small game."
If you are approached by a company which needs a specific calculator program, ask them to pay you upfront. If they won't, don't.
If you want to make a game, do it. If you won't do it without getting money for it, don't.

>Great. So I should be a beggar.

>implying selling anything else is not begging unless the product is unique

I think the GPL says you can sell your software as long as you provide a copy of your source on request

>How is my boss gonna get paid under GPL?
What does his salary has anything to do with the GPL?

>boss pays you to write software for the company
>company uses that software to do work that was done by humans before, or just to automate shit

Assuming its a software company (that writes software for other companies to use), it works exactly the same as proprietary software. You can sell your software, as long as you sell it with the source code.

>literally socialism code
>making money

You're retarded and autistic, you gotta be trolling to miss the point like that.

Corporate backing from businesses wanting to propagate certain technologies to shift the technological landscape in their favor so they can sell support contracts, undercut competitors' vendor lock-in, gain developer mindshare, or drive customers to their own platforms.

Time for Sup Forums!!

You don't, unless you take donations. Then again, if its free, no one is going to donate. You shouldn't expect to make any money on something you're giving away for free.