https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10500298
I'm curious what you and Mario think about my scheme of paid, perpetually-licensed, OSS software. It's in alpha stage obviously with potential for improvement.
If you actually meant "commercial use", such that the default version prohibited commercial use, that's a non-starter, as it's incompatible with the standards for either Free Software or Open Source Software; you would massively curtail both contribution and usage of the project by doing so. You'd also, in the process, likely prevent anyone from contributing to that project in the course of their job, which doesn't seem like your intent.
(Requiring submission of contributions back to the original project rather than only to those you distribute a binary to is also slightly questionable, though some will accept it. Prohibiting commercial use is the dealbreaker.)
That's worth remembering if possible.
"If you actually meant "commercial use", such that the default version prohibited commercial use"
The idea is it's just like open-source software except you pay for it. People can fix it, modify it, contribute to it, whatever. Might force the mods to be shared with everyone if using free license or let them not be shared if people are paying for it. The money coming in creates active development. The license keeps them from closing things back up or pulling it off the market. Trying to figure out what terms maintain the major benefits of FOSS while preventing the worst parts of proprietary model and keeping money in for development/maintenance.
The philosophy is basically "you get what you pay for or contribute to," with source and benefits that brings. Sort of a middle ground between proprietary and FOSS. Gotta be one that could work but devil is in the details.
Note: Burroughs' 1960's OS, MCP, was delivered as source to paying customers. They could modify it as they saw fit and optionally submit modifications back. Burroughs would try to integrate good submissions into later releases. It was the first or one of the earliest proprietary and OSS combinations.
Now, on the other hand, you could build a community around a GPLed project, or an AGPLed project, funded by selling licenses to use that project in proprietary software. In practice, that will have a very similar effect, while remaining FOSS. And your comments and ideas about using that licensing revenue to directly support the community rather than just a company sound quite appealing.