Re: dual-licensing

> <snip, dual-licensing and CLAs>
> If the rest are silent supporters, that's great, but
> I'd love to actually hear you help me make the 
> case - or simply voice your support.

My biggest problem is that I have a hard time shutting
up.  ;-))

> <snip>, 
> * Ideally, I wish all the software could be free
> software.  Even if such becomes the reality, the
> cost of developing that software will never be
> free, and development organizations will always need
> to derive revenue somehow.

Agreed, *completely*.  I use free software and am
happy to contribute to free software, but when it
comes down to it, our company can *only* consider
Qt and MFC because they offer licensing for commercial
products.  (We're completely happy with the Qt
dual-licensing.)

For this (highly pragmatic) reason, we would favor a
dual-licensing structure as you've proposed.  Open
source is good, but there are many good reasons to use
dual-licensing to have companies help fund open
source efforts.

> <snip, revenue to fund open source development>

*exactly*.

> <snip, future licensing>

Methinks it's important to pretend Zynot is the size
of RedHat and think this through:  Big noisy
community,
*how* is direction understood?  Who defines where the
money goes, and what are the voices to make those
decisions?  Yes, hard decisions, but I would doubt
that a simple "majority democracy" vote will be
sufficient.

But, I still agree that the direction is good:  these
things can be worked out.

> * I also own a embedded Linux consultancy.  I want
> to be able to say
> that non-GPL is an option - and that is an option
> for those works that I
> create by myself from scratch and without outside
> contributions.

Fine with me.

> <snip>,
> * I am trying to convey what I perceive as a real
> need for the
> organization, bearing in mind that I personally feel
> this is the right
> thing to do for open source in the long term.
> 
> I hope these spark more pointed lines of
> conversation that can help us
> move these topics along to some sort of conclusion.

I don't doubt that many "pointed" things will be 
headed your way for making these proposals, but I
agree *completely* with the rationale:

Software development is not free, hosting servers
and download sites cost money.  Altruistic behaviors
and common goals are the efficiency and cohesive
core of our effort, but we'd do much better if we
could leverage some extra $$ from those corporations
that are happy to pay for the open source we develop.

It is unrealistic to say that "software development
is free", or to avoid describing a viable revenue
model for companies using open source.  We need a
dual-licensing structure.

> I must regretfully annouce the (hopefully
> non-permenant) departure of a
> few of developers, notably including Jon Nall and
> Mark Guertin. These
> individuals indicated the CLA was a key part of
> their leaving, and my
> last post to the main zynot mailing list shows the
> board acknowledges
> and respects this community sentiment.

I also hope this is a non-permanant thing, as I 
recognize those names as significant.

I'm not a board-member and not a key decision maker
in any way, but one of the biggest reason I'm closely
following Zynaut is *because* of the dual-licensing
ideas.

We use GPL'd software, but never in our products.
It's relegated to servers, OS's, office tools, etc.,
but our company requires more control over the code
(real-time processing with OTS and custom hardware,
some RTOS, much industry-specific analysis and 
instrumentation control for bio-tech).  With a 
dual-licensing structure, we can actually use open
source in our products (hence, our interest in Qt).

So, I'm saying that the dual-licensing is *exactly*
what we need that we can't get in other distros, and
why we find Zynaut interesting.  Moreover, dual-
licensing is a *requirement* to move our company
away from Win32 to reliance upon open source, thus
improving open source.  Surely, our company isn't
the only one.  And, as much as I like open source and
it's superior to alternatives, without a
dual-licensing
structure, I can't even make an argument to management
to replace our current RTOS with a linux distro.

I read the initial reactions to the dual-licensing
idea, and even though I understand the fear many have
that some "privaledged few" might profit from the work
by the many, I think the "GPL or die" is unrealistic.
If Zynaut doesn't want to be "just another distro",
it must define a value proposition.  If that value
proposition is through dual-licensing (which I believe
can be reasonable), then we only need worry that the
organization's success doesn't let the group in charge
profit unfairly.  I believe that can be managed
through rules, oversight, and some cohesive direction
that's not based on letting idiots with "VP" in their
title call the shots.

Just a thought.

--charley
(C++ programmer)



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