Ask HN: Why don't more open-source projects monetize?
Because monetizing your open-source project means you take on a second job.<p>Here are your choices:<p>* Turn your OSS project into a company (Docker). The pro is that you can capture a lot of the value, the con is that you&#x27;re splitting your project into CE&#x2F;EE and also now you&#x27;re a CEO<p>* Give the software away for free and charge for the hosting (Gitlab). Pro here is that you get recurring revenue, but the con is that now you&#x27;re in DevOps and wear a pager. Also this model doesn&#x27;t work well for libraries, only &quot;apps&quot;.<p>* Charge for support (Ubuntu, Nginx-ish). Pro here is that by helping folks implement your software, you&#x27;ll have a long line of success stories. Con here is that it isn&#x27;t scalable - your upside is bounded by the hours you can bill<p>* Get a job at a company that will fund you to work on it (React, Angular). Pro here is that you can make tons of money with a job you love. Nice work, if you can get it. Con is that now you work for that company and you&#x27;re subject to whatever whims they have.<p>* Run a Kickstarter (Light Table, Diaspora). Pro: you can gauge demand and you don&#x27;t have a boss. Cons: it&#x27;s one-time revenue, you have potentially inflated expectations, and just kidding, now you have 1,000 bosses.<p>* Run a Patreon (Vue). Pro: you have autonomy and recurring revenue (yay!). Con: now you&#x27;re a personality. This is limited to celebs who are good at marketing _themselves_ as much as their software<p>* Ask for donations (Babel, Webpack). Pro: this works for tools and libraries (not just apps) and you can keep your mission. Con: Companies feel these donations have ambiguous deliverables. There&#x27;s a lot of mental overhead too (How many projects can one company fund per month?)<p>* Sell documentation, books, videos (React Training, my current gig). Pro: JavaScript fatigue makes you money! Con: Writing the docs isn&#x27;t as satisfying as writing software (for many developers)<p>So to answer your question: monetizing your open-source project means you take on another job _besides writing software_.<p>In an ideal world if you write software and it gets used, you&#x27;d be able to capture some share of that value. But we&#x27;re not there yet.<p>[If you want to chat more about funding OSS, reach out to me (see my profile). I&#x27;m working on a few new ideas.]