How not to make money with open-source software

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[edit] Have a "free version" and a "pro version" (with more features)

— Tyler (2006-07-07 22:27)

This is commonly done with shareware. But I assert that it's not a good idea with open-source, free software.

Why not? Because, quite simply, it will tick off your customers.

Also, your open-source community will just develop their own free versions of whatever features are in your "pro version". And then you will be competing with your own community / userbase, when it would be much better for you to be cooperating with them. Competing with your customers is sure to create/be a conflict of interest and will cause you to lose credibility (and along with that customers).

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