Start a Business Using Only Free and Open Source Tools!
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Since we are all for the most part FOSS enthusiasts, why not come together and form some way to make at least some side money as a group will free and open source tools and techniques? Thoughts?
I have considered putting myself out there as a Free and Open Source Artist/Swiss Army knife for people who care about supporting free software based services. If anyone has any information about this topic, please share!
I know some of us aside from myself have considered this. We can help each other try to live more fully in our beliefs.
...Interesting there is no reply for many days :D
name at domain wrote:
> Since we are all for the most part FOSS enthusiasts, why not come
> together and form some way to make at least some side money as a group
> will free and open source tools and techniques? Thoughts?
There are a lot of websites, mailing lists, and other resources for
discussing these things. Any search engine has them indexed. If you're
looking for more help I suggest that you post more specifics of what you're
looking for us to comment on.
Im not looking for "help". I was hoping to start a conversation. Probably not the best to put this on a Trisquel forum though. Noted.
I've been thinking about your post since you wrote it. There's a big opportunity in the fields of online sales and of healthcare in America and Europe, where there are huge financial penalties for companies and hospitals who get their customer's/patient's data hacked.
If you could show them how to encrypt and organize their transactions and database records using libre hardware and libre software that can be fully audited, you could find some potential customers. With the powerful Talos II fully libre hardware servers, once Trisquel 9 is released and supports Talos II's Power9 processors, you could have a fully libre stack to promote. And a stack that could compete with the latest Wintel offerings in terms of processing speed.
Hi all,
I am new here and I was also thinking about this issue since I read this post. I agree with Andy that there are some big opportunities/needs in different fields, mainly healthcare and education.
We already have a GNU Project that could help in the healthcare field: GNU Health (http://gnuhealth.org/home). I am already working with them trying to improve their Data Protection features, encryption is already there but there is more to do: transparency, unlinkability, ability to intervene. It would be quite good if we could build an use case in the USA and it could be a nice begin for this new business.
Another project would be to develop some kind of GNU Privacy as an Information System for different kinds of organizations. Sadly I am not a developer but I would like to contact anybody interested in such a project.
Healthcare is a good idea, I need to install GNU Health and have a look at its capabilities. Healthcare is 20% of the US economy, and we have strict laws making hospitals and healthcare companies responsible to stop hacking of patient's data. A libre solution that can be audited from top to bottom is a very intriguing idea.
I agree with you. Please, let me know what you think about GNU Health after installing and checking it. As I wrote before I am trying to improve some Data Protection features.
About installing GNU Health on Trisquel 8 I have another thread about this because I had some problems when trying to install it:
https://trisquel.info/en/forum/problems-installing-gnu-health-trisquel-8
It seems to me the argument for not using Libre software and tools in business is that there is no warranty; so if something should go wrong and important files are lost, there is no one to blame. Also, we have a society that has grown accustomed to the idea that the software is a trade secret. With art creation, people are inspired by eachothers works all the time and sample colors and shapes from eachothers images. Is there a way this could be done with code? one can sample how a certain function works but not know exactly how all the code is interconnected? I think the trouble with code is that code does things, which art does not... How can code be made transparent while having companies protect their IP? I can't think of a way... All I can think of is that making software closed source should be illegal OR maybe have a company type like Public Benefit Corporation where its illegal to use closed source software.
Thinking out loud here...
Most people don't care about software being Free or not, the code being opensourced or not. They just want to do their computing.
Most of the time when I tell people(who don't know much about free/non-free), that I sell librebooted laptops and Free hardware, I need to explain what it is, why Free Software is important, ...
non-free "beautiful" designed software is more attractive in general, than "outdated"(or retro) looking free software.
The problem is, there aren't enough attention in the educational system about Free/Open software or hardware. I didn't know about Free Software Movement until 2015, before that, I was frustrated that Something like Free Software didn't existed(because I thought so), then I did my own research to find out that it already existed way before I was even born ;).
Generally, people know about Linux(not Gnu/Linux), they think free software is gratis. So when you pay to a software it is more valuable, there is a professional team behind it, so it looks also beautiful, and free(gratis) is some nerd developing in the attic without great looking (design) software.
edit: typo's and constructions corrected
> Most people don't care about software being Free or not, the code being opensourced or not. They just want to do their computing.
Owners of healthcare and online retail businesses in the US are feeling a lot of pain because of how frequently they've been exposed to hugely expensive data breaches due to the shoddiness and false promises from the vendors of the proprietary hardware/software stacks they use. They are beginning to care a great deal about whether or not their hardware and software stack can be audited thoroughly. IBM/RedHat, Oracle, Google and others are making enormous amounts of money from these customers by claiming "openness", even when they are really just offering a hybrid of libre and proprietary offerings.
I know of a few free software projects out there that are "beautiful" as you say and not "retro". The good thing about free software is that we can decide to make it beautiful or modern if we care to do so. non-free software is not always modern and beautiful and if you as a user wanted to make it beautiful, you couldn't.
if free software was sold more often, we might be able to clear up the preconception that free software must be also low quality. part of the reason why i brought up this topic, was to discuss how we can make free software more immediately and obviously more valuable than proprietary software. is locking down the source code the only way to make money from software?
This is important to reflect on.
Locking down the source code is not the only way to make money from software, as I tried to explain in https://trisquel.info/fr/forum/start-business-using-only-free-and-open-source-tools#comment-141842
I know, there exist beautifull designed free software.
When I writed my reply, I was thinking more like:
Microsoft Office vs LibreOffice(which came from OpenOffice)
MacOs desktop vs mate (of course you can confugire it, but macos is already configured)
Personally I switched to i3-gaps and adapta-nokto theme and papyrus icon set. Thanks to threads on this forum :)
A little bit of "agressive" marketing can help :)
Example, convincing a hardware producer to sell with Free os, instead of Windows.
Adding ads on website(like youtube, facebook, twitter), so more people can see it and know about FreeSoftware. I know this is a little bit against the principles, but the more people know it, the more people will be interested.
Try to convince family and friends in using FreeSoftware and Hardware.
Try to convince non-profits to use freeSoftware(software can be free, so let them pay for the service), reusing refurbished hardware is more ecological(with libreboot) and cheaper then buying a new hardware to replace every 3-4 years, because we can't update the firmware.
When deploying a service for a client, explain the license they apply for and whatever they can do with it, and what they can't do.
While doing business with clients, try to convince them multiple times(give your personal experience with FreeSoftware).
I am a member!
_On Beautiful Design_
I was tempted to say, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder," but that's not even precisely the case here.
Aesthetics and fashion are dictated by the dominant corporations (e.g. material design).
We are taught to expect certain things through propaganda and the huge market share of these companies (most of us grow up immersed in it), and when we are presented with a different approach we find it initially foreign, unfriendly and sometimes ugly (Emacs could be one example).
This is an interesting UX critique: http://contemporary-home-computing.org/RUE/
As a contribution, in Brazil the Consumer Protection and Defense Code demands every service or product *sold* to come with a legally implied warranty of 90 days for durable things such as software. So the "no warranty" clause is void in Brazil, but this does not nullify possible other parts of the license.
Also, AGPL/GPL at least in version 3.0 allow to replace the "no warranty" part of the notice with a warranty-giving one, that in Brazil would be complementary to the one implied by law in Brazil.
Em 4 de julho de 2019 09:52:17 BRT, name at domain escreveu:
>It seems to me the argument for not using Libre software and tools in
>business is that there is no warranty; so if something should go wrong
>and
>important files are lost, there is no one to blame. Also, we have a
>society
>that has grown accustomed to the idea that the software is a trade
>secret.
>With art creation, people are inspired by eachothers works all the time
>and
>sample colors and shapes from eachothers images. Is there a way this
>could be
>done with code? one can sample how a certain function works but not
>know
>exactly how all the code is interconnected? I think the trouble with
>code is
>that code does things, which art does not... How can code be made
>transparent
>while having companies protect their IP? I can't think of a way... All
>I can
>think of is that making software closed source should be illegal OR
>maybe
>have a company type like Public Benefit Corporation where its illegal
>to use
>closed source software.
>
>Thinking out loud here...
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That joinmastodon website you're linking to in your signature has some JS elements, do you know if it's free JS?
no.
Support for free software is actually one the most thriving segment of IT. Besides a few huge companies (like IBM), there are many local companies that sell such a support: you have somebody to blame, face to face, far more easily than with proprietary software (especially if built abroad) and its imposed monopoly for support (well, support that actually involves source code modification, like correcting bugs).
About the term "Intellectual Property", please read https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.html
Having patents on software makes no sense. Most of the world (China, India, the EU, Brazil, etc.) does not authorize them. Free software is based on the copyright law: licenses (such as the GNU GPL) protect it. I see nothing wrong with trademarks (as long as the trademark policy does not impose restrictions that have little to do with identifying the product). Many free software programs are actually trademarked: Linux, Firefox, etc.
Building a 100% free computing system to sell. 100%. Hardware blueprints and free firmware of *all* the components. I'd buy it.
It would sell very easily. I think there is potential with the RISC-V for this. Im certain Purism and System 76 are looking into it.
I've recently put together a resource on LibrePlanet which you're all welcome to contribute to. It's about making money writing libre software specifically.
https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Making_money_as_a_libre_software_programmer
Other than writing libre software, selling support for libre software is already common as Magic Banana wrote. Also there's this talk on having a libre software IT business:
Really though, any business is a "libre software business" if they have control over their own computing. All businesses deserve and would benefit from this in theory.
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