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Comment by fierarul | Hacker News Reader

Because I don't want to add another website/API to the mix.

I've noticed now that they also seem to push towards a subscription model for the EC2 images... I don't really like that. TurnKey always looked like something odd to me each time I saw it mentioned on HN: it's open source-y, but for the one stuff I might give it a try (cloud image/AMI) they want to introduce some fees somehow.

This has kept me from trying them and sticking to the Alestic/Canonical base images.

BTW, just googled your name and found out you're one of the founders but I won't rephrase the lines above, the message remains.

I have one question regarding your open-source model: how exactly does one build one of your AMIs? Your FAQ mentions http://code.turnkeylinux.org/ and http://github.com/turnkeylinux but how does everything go together ?

What is your equivalent of 'make lamp' or 'make drupal6'? (Just asking, didn't dig too much but also didn't see it very font-center).

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Just to be clear, TurnKey Linux _is_ an open source project. All custom packages are open source, and all changes made to other packages are published as well, according to the GPL. The ISO and VM builds are free to download and use, no strings attached what so ever.

The subscription you are referring to is currently free. 6 months ago we began soliciting feedback from the community regarding pricing [1]. You might want to take a look at the feedback we have received and the motivation behind adding a premium to the AMI images. We have yet to come to a decision though, so feedback is most definitely welcome.

In a nutshell, the idea is to fund development. When you use Amazon EC2, you are already charged on usage, so the idea is to add a reasonable mark-up on those fees so people who are using TurnKey give back a little bit into a pool which helps support the project and fund future development.

We believe this is a win-win for the community, because a premium would fund development of open source appliances rather than expensive and closed proprietary alternatives. To the casual user a few bucks here and there would hardly be noticed on their bill but multiply this thousands of times over and suddenly we have the resources to do much more for the project's users.

[1] http://www.turnkeylinux.org/polls/amazon-ec2-fees

I was just wondering how do I create an AMI from the sources, ISO or VM builds ? If this isn't possible then everything is open-source, but this part of your project is closed, probably because it also seems to be the preferred way to charge the users (at some point).

Adding an hourly fee in the future for your AMIs would make everything very expensive. 10% over the EC2 rate sounds cheap if you only test the 'appliance' for a few hours, but 2 large instances cost about $500 per month. 10% of that would be $50. This is a whole lot compared to the usual $0 Canonical or Alestic get for their images.

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