Nekkid Ninjas

Link: http://www.pseudorant.com/joomla-money-opensource

Follow up:

I won't go into proprietary or encrypted add ons for open source extensions here. That is a different story. What I am talking about are Commercially available Open Source programs or extensions to Open Source programs. In this case, the PHP based CMS Joomla.

The main contention put forward by these people is that charging for Open Source code you have personally developed is somehow morally wrong.

The hypocrisy is that they are saying asking for a fair reward for your efforts and time and not giving them everything they want for no better reason than because they want it, makes you greedy.

In simple terms:

I want A, you want B. You are morally wrong for wanting to make a fair trade of A for B. You should give me A for nothing you greedy person.

I am not greedy for expecting you to give me something for nothing. But you are greedy for wanting a fair trade.

I am sure everyone with a healthy sense of right and wrong can now see who the greedy one really is in this equation.

The funniest part is that the author in fact even attempts to ply sympathy from the readers because he was working on a friend's site "at margin" and thus couldn't afford to pay for an extension that he wanted.

He expects people to sympathize with and pity him for working at margin while saying other people are greedy for not working for him for free.

Why isn't he working on his friend's site for free? Why isn't he working on all his client's sites for free?

Because he has bills to pay, that's why.

Believe it or not, commercial OSDs have bills to pay too. They may also have a family to feed, clothe, take to the doctor etc.

They are human too, not robot slaves subsisting on ingratitude and download counts only.

A comment by Tim Beckwith lower down was one I personally have heard (or variant of) many, many times now.

I am a retired person on a fixed income who, as a volunteer, has developed and supports two not-for-profit websites (one of which is reported in this response). I developed these sites using Joomla because of the features it offered. But I simply do not use any themes, modules, extensions, or anything that requires payment. I just can’t afford to do that.
That means I, too, am dismayed at the number of Joomla tool and enhancement add-ons which require payment. It’s as if the folks who are producing them assume all developers are making tons of money from websites. So they want their share of the big bucks available.
Worse, these greedy bozos are taking advantage of a free and open-source offering developed by dedicated, hard-working volunteers to make their profits.
To me they are no better than blood-sucking mosquitoes. A nuisance which should be controlled in the interest of public health.
Sorry. I can get a bit passionate at times.

Well for starters, not for profit doesn't = not for income. Nothing except a lack of motivation or creativity stops them making enough money to buy some extensions.

Or if money really is a problem why not offer something else of value. Write a tutorial on an extension, give some reviews, fix a bug, offer ad space. There are millions of things you could do to earn a product or membership.

I have personally had many people present this argument to me about not having enough money. When I say that I am happy to have them do something of value for me so that we both receive a fair trade, they still refuse.

Some people simply refuse to offer any sort of value to others, yet expect and demand those others give them items and services they value. Then have the gall to call the people looking to trade equal value 'greedy'.

I admire that people work volunteer I really do. I do it myself for many hours a week. But I don't use it as an excuse to try to morally extort others into giving up their income and volunteering to give me whatever I want.

Just because someone chooses to volunteer doesn't mean that others must immediately accommodate their every whim.

I can't walk into the local Ferrari dealership and say 'I work volunteer, and I can't afford a Ferrari but I want one, give it to me or you are greedy and immoral.' I would get locked up.

If I expected any other professional on the planet to work for free I would get laughed at.

Is your doctor greedy because he asks for a salary? Your mechanic? Your Dentist? Your grabage man? Your plumber? I bet the people who clean the toilets at your office gets paid for their job, the greedy people!

Why are OSDs an exception?

If you transpose a different profession, service or product or person into these expectations they instantly change into an absurd and selfish demand.

I can't believe this guy wanted to be paid after he cleaned my toilets?

I hate Hawaii, I want a house there but no one will give me theirs. They want me to pay for it. What is wrong with these people?

This kid at school during the exams finished before me, and he wouldn't give me his sheet so I could hand it in. What a terrible person!

You should have seen this greedy guy at the restaurant. I told him to give me his wife because I thought she was pretty and would look good at my place and he hit me!

I went to a farm down the road because I really wanted a lot of apples to eat, and the farmer wouldn't let me take his crops for this year. He insisted I pay for them. what nerve!

The damn bartender told me I had to pay for my food and drinks at the Pub. He is so terrible!

See what I mean?

Why is an OSD any different? Why is demanding that an OSD spends 40-60 hours a week making you products you want, give you support whenever you want it and keep upgrading them with new features you want, while expecting to give them nothing in return acceptable?

Back to our commenter, he said something interesting about this: He is a retiree on a pension.

Which means his money, however little, keeps coming in if he stops working. He can afford to volunteer because he gets paid every month by whoever is supplying his pension.

OSDs, for the most part, do not have pensions. They don't have money that magically falls out of the sky either. They have the same 24 hours in a day that anyone else does and they need to spend some of that time earning a living.

If your boss came into your office and said...

Hi Bob, look, we have decided that you are too greedy for wanting a salary and health care, so we are going to stop paying you. But we expect you to keep coming to work and in fact we even want you to do more overtime because we like you so much.

How many people would walk out on their job then and there?

Congratulations, your are now a greedy, morally terrible person by the Author's and commenter's standards. How dare you not work for someone for free because they want what you do!

The big logic gap people have to overcome is that "I want" does not equal "I am entitled to at someone else's expense"

Because that is what producing any code, Open or Closed source, is - it's an expense.

The developer must spend their time and energy writing code. Time and energy that is spent so you can have a better site, or the same site only quicker.

No one is automatically entitled to another person's time no matter what type of code they write.

All this expectant ungrateful attitude is going to do is drive people with skills away from open source, because they want to do more than just write code all day for free so other people, who most of the time don't even say thanks, can have a better life.

They have families to spend time with. Hobbies to pursue. Sports to play and so on.

If an OSD chooses a commercial model it means they want to spend more time coding their extensions, and not have to divide their time between earning a living, writing code for other people, and living their life.

Instead of ridiculing them, people should be supporting them. Open Source only truly becomes amazing when it has commercial support.

Would Linux be where it is today without commercial interests? No.
Would Mysql? No.
Would Open Office? No.
Would PHP? No.
Would the GNU GPL? No.
Would Joomla? No.

Name for me a major Open Source project and I can find a commercial interest there.

Yes the Joomla CMS is free. But that doesn't mean that the team makes nothing from it. Joomla grew out of Mambo which for a long time was financially funded by Miro Corp.

The core team and developers charge large amounts as consultants and speakers, some of them have even started their own commercial template and extension enterprises, some open source, some closed.

Then, almost every single one of the major 'free' Joomla Extensions, is actually backed by commercial sales or subscriptions. Community Builder, Sobi, All Videos, JCE, AEC, and so on.

Those that aren't still have a commercial backing, even if it's just that the developer makes websites or has a day job.

Why do 100% non commercial projects burn out far, far more often than commercial ones? Because after a while a developer gets tired of satisfying everyone except themselves.

I run a Commercial Open Source Extension Club. I can guarantee you that we would not exist today, and nor would our 60+ extensions (almost 30 of which are actually free) if we weren't commercial.

Because we exist, and have income we are able to donate or take subscriptions at many other Open Source projects, helping them keep going for free.

If we didn't have income we couldn't support those projects, so some of them may have collapsed, depriving the community of even more extensions.

If we didn't have income we couldn't sponsor Joomla days, giving people more rewarding Joomla Experiences, and supporting the developer communities around the world.

If we didn't have income (and a fantastic group of members) then we couldn't have given almost $2000 to one our staff members to help his mother get through a breast operation.

The people who call us greedy are the same people who don't donate to free products, don't sponsor joomla days, and don't donate to help out other people's mums. They are upset when they can't just take, take, take from other people and call them greedy for not letting them.

In conclusion, if asking for a fair compensation for your efforts, and then using part of that compensation to help make the lives of thousands of other people richer and more fun is being greedy and immoral, while demanding others become your personal slave and work for you for free is moral and good...

Then please send me straight to Hell. The bunch there seem a heck of a lot nicer than the 'good guys' given the moral scale these people measure by.