Kick Start to Open Source

Kick Start to Open SourceTharindu Dassanayake

What is a Source?

Source refers to source code, the human readableversion of what makes a program run.

Open Source

Free for use Pay for the maintenance and support

Closed Source

Pay for use Pay for the maintenance and support

FREE means not the COST

Four Freedoms

0: The freedom to run the program, for any purpos1: The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs 2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbour3. The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits.

Pros and Cons

Open Source

Pros

Larger Developer Support Customizable Extended Comunity Support

Cons No guarantee of updates

Closed Source

Pros Less Confussion for Coustomers Unified Experience More Profitable

Cons Have to pay Can not Make customized changes to it

Business Models for Open Source

Donations It’s more typical of individuals or non-profit groups running an Open Source project. Implement a Paypal donations button on your main site. Run a Kicstarter or IndieGoGo campaign.

http://www.kickstarter.comhttp://www.indiegogo.com/

Companies sell product, and Beggars take donations

Merchandise

More typical of individuals or non-profits. T-shirts, coffee mugs, squeezy toys and so on. Cafe Press to make and sell your merchandise.

http://www.cafepress.com

Consulting and Training Work-for-hire is a simple and direct way to get money from your Open Source product. Different features, integration with their existing software. You can get paid at an hourly rate or at a fixed rate for delivery of the functionality.

Product Ware

Software is free. You just buy the box it runs in.

License Exemptions “Dual licensing” or “Commercial licensing”. First, you must have a restrictive license, and you must have copyright on all of the software. Second, you must have software that’s useful to third-party developers. AGPL is good for this for Web sites, and GPL is good for libraries or development tools.

Software as a Service (SaaS)

Especially for software that can be used over the Internet (like a Web application), the software-as-a-service model can be really valuable.

Control of Audience One great way to make money with Open Source software is to use it as a conduit for a proprietary service. Firefox; Mozilla derives tens of millions of dollars of annual revenue from their Open Source browser by selling the space as the default home page to Google.

Find Your OwnBut..

You shouldn’t go into a new startup without at least thinking of all these options.

Thank Youtharindu@sqrmobile.com