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Comment by haunter | Hacker News Reader

I'm not sure it fits the free and/or libre software philosophy but I'm a big fan of releasing otherwise free and open source software as a paid version and with some exclusive QoL features in proprietary store fronts.

For example Krita. https://krita.org/en/download/ FOSS but you can buy it on Steam, Microsoft Store, Epic Store, and Apple Store. You get one exclusive feature, automatic updates (and more recently Steam Cloud sync support), and you also support the developers (on the other hand Valve, MS, Epic, and Apple also gets a cut too).

If you read for example the Steam reviews everyone points out that it's a free software but buying on Steam is also a good and very importantly straightforward way to support the devs + the platform itself has such a pull ("buying games you never play") that people buy it just for the case of having it in their library

https://store.steampowered.com/app/280680/Krita

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Filebot used to be open source. I bought it on the AppStore, it was a way to support development and I figured it would give me easier updates that would just happen in the background.

When Apple moved to ARM, the App Store version lagged behind. An ARM version was available, but not in the App Store. I assume this is because that ARM version was a separate download instead of being a universal app, and the x86 app would run on everything (for now).

The app is no longer open source, and is paid. To get the ARM version (due to my stubbornness in not wanting to install Rosetta), I had to pay again just to get the app through a different means of distribution.

Too many run-ins with silly issues like this can really sour a person on the “free app in a paid store” model.

That can happen regardless of which storefront you use to buy a free app. It's more of a developer-specific nitpick than a chronic problem with FOSS and freeware.

If you're happy to sponsor the app's development, then owning the App Store version should make you feel proud. The developer is still able to make a living thanks to you, and they're offering extended support if you're unwilling to use a fork of the free version. A good example of this is Dwarf Fortress, which I have bought on Steam 3 times now so that I could gift it to two of my friends. God willing, nothing will prevent me from buying a 4th and 5th copy when Christmas rolls around.

Sounds like the problem is the app later became nonfree.

This kind of thing happens to apps regardless of whether they are closed source or FOSS.

If management of a closed source app in an app store changes in a way that you don't like, you have zero recourse.

If it happens to a FOSS app, then you could potentially use the source to install the app yourself or pay another supplier to do it for you.

Although given the reality of the low cost of mobile apps and small, niche user bases, your purchase probably amounts to something more like contributing to a tip jar anyway.

I think I have donated more for Inkscape, Gimp, Firefox, and Libre Office than I ever spent on proprietary software. I also tend to buy paid versions of open-source apps in app stores, where available. It's great when a piece of open-source software has an easy donation link / button.

That said, I tend to trust all closed-source software significantly less, even if it's given away for free. Especially is it's given away for free.

Without knowing how much you've paid for proprietary software, that could be a lot, or a little. If you're coming from a position where there is alternative FOSS software available to use, that's your bubble/sphere of experience. In other realms, say software for doing aerospace CAD, there is no FOSS available because it's just such a niche piece of software.

I mostly speak about more mundane software than CAD. I would say that the total sums involved are in the $100-$200 range, accumulated from multiple $5-$10 donations and purchases. I buy really, really little proprietary software %)

The free software philosophy aside, I feel like another problem is that once you start accepting payments then you start accepting various forms of responsibility/liability/accountability/etc. along with it. At a high enough price it'd become worth it, but that might not be anywhere near the price that your customers/users want to support you at.

Maybe but lots of $2 apps exist from random devs who don't take much responsibility.

I don't think this counts as an exclusive feature. But yes this pay for the binary model "libre non gratis" is a very good model.

UTM is another great example of this, which is basically a GUI for QEMU. They have a Mac App store $9.99 version and the free open source version:

https://github.com/utmapp/UTM

Free open source -> compile it yourself

Affordable binaries and SASS are fine options that I’d like to see

Doesn't work, someone else would make them available for free.

Depends on the affordability and friction to pay, vs getting software from a random or unknown source vs a maker.

I understand it didn't work, but I think there is a way to get it to work (good enough).

Plenty of people pirate commercial software out of random sources, this isn't really an impediment.

Not a very effective way to support the devs though: only about 60% of what you pay gets to the developers, because of Steam's cut and VAT.

Yet by the active unique user numbers they have estimated sold at least ~168k copies and maybe upwards ~500k https://steamdb.info/app/280680/charts/ And that's Steam alone. I'd be really curious compared to this how many people click on the Donate button on the Krita homepage.

That's a lot of purchases imo for a project like this. I'm kind of ambivalent about the store cuts but they give a huge enough exposure to any game or software.

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