alt Hacker NewsWrite some software, give it away for free
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I don't think this debate has an easy answer. Yes, not everything should be about money, but yes, we all need to make money to survive.
I think we all agree the answer isn't, "No one should make any money writing software." I also think we can agree that the answer isn't, "you should charge money for every bit of software you write."
So how do we decide which is which?
I don't want to stop being a professional software developer. I have loved being able to support myself and my family by doing my favorite activity. It has let me enjoy going to work every day for over 20 years.
I also don't think I should charge for random code work that I do for fun, though. I am not trying to monetize every minute of my day... but I do want to monetize enough of it that I can pay my mortgage, buy food, save for my retirement, and have some fun along the way.
I don't know exactly where I am going with this, but it is my gut reaction when I see a post about how horrible it is to make money off of writing software. It has to be more nuanced than that.
I got burned with an attitude like this: unexpectedly, people who had downloaded my open source tool for free started expecting support. Some of them sent pretty unfriendly emails.
> If software development is treated as a vehicle for self-exploration, rather than just a means to a financial end, this makes a lot more sense. From my experience, it also generally produces better software that doesn't come with user hostile (value extracting) actions or features because there's no expectation of a financial return.
I strongly identify with all of this. I started programming computers when I was about 7, so now I've been doing it for decades.
I sort of accidentally made it a career for a few years, because I was really good at it, but I didn't like being a professional software developer for a huge tech company.
I still like writing code though, and view it primarily as a means for exploration, figuring out how things work and explaining and systematizing them for myself and for others.
Even in these comments I keep hearing the same complaint: "when you do open source people come asking for support and complaining about your software"
I don't get why this is such an issue. You can just ignore these people if you don't want to interact with them. You shouldn't take bug reports or support requests personally.
I resonate with this blog post a lot.
I think there is something to be said for monetizing ones' hobbies, but I've recently been taking some forays into this world of "build something amazing and give it away for free" as well. I recently took a very big experimental plunge in this path, and I'm curious how well it will work out for me.
Open-source state-of-the-art Magic: The Gathering card identification pipeline:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHieOcmC7Dw
I used to do this kind of image recognition for a living, but I've been out of the business for a little while now. I had some ideas for a different approach from what I've done in the past and decided to code it up. This version is far better than anything else I've ever done -- especially for scanning against busy backgrounds or with occlusions, and also for noticing fine differences between otherwise difficult-to-distinguish printings.
I didn't have any interested customers waiting for this, so -- much like the OP -- decided to create an experiment and release it open source. I'm not opposed to having paths to monetize it (for people who want to license it for closed-source commercial projects), but I'm not trying to commercialize it so much as I would love to see how far we can take it with open-source.
I don't know which path I should take with this.
The biggest downside is that I feel like I've had a hard time getting people to be as interested in this project as I would have expected -- I believe this truly is the best identification software available (I've built some benchmarks to test it [0]), and maybe the market is just a bit flooded for such things (?), but I suspect that one very strong problem is that if you don't charge for something, then there is a perceived lack of value.
Sometimes I wonder if I would have more interest in this project if I _weren't_ trying to give it away.
For me, that's been the most negative aspect about releasing this for free so far.
I started out in the BBS and demoscene of the 90s. The glory days of computing in my opinion, because of the technical innovation (people were making magic with 7mhz processors) and how the community arranged itself. e.g, some ANSI artists in the artpack scene went on to become legit artists, but nobody was sitting around grinding ANSIs to make millions or raise capital. I think about that era in my own open source work today, I just work on what I enjoy and find interesting and whatever happens happens as long as I can pay the bills.
If I was going to write something for free, it would some weird itch-scratching thing for Plan 9 or something, it wouldn't be something most people would ever want.
Realistically though, I'm not going to build software for free any more than I'm going to tidy someone's garden for free.
FOSS has delivered some great software, it's also demonetised a lot of areas where software developers could be earning a living. I don't think software developers should feel any need to give away their efforts than any other professional should.
FOSS has created pricing race to the bottom in software, and taken away financial incentive for improvement, it's not a 100% net positive.
A lot of comments can't help but mention the constant looming threat of potentially permanent destitution that pervades our society. It's increasingly hard to understand the position of people who think that this is a feature, excepting of course those very few with the resources to use that pressure rather than be driven by it
I just interviewed somebody who works for mac productivity app that has been around forever. For many years it worked as a simple one to two person operation and then they took some money and started to try and scale the business. But it is an idiosyncratic product that has a small number of highly passionate users. They tried to make it a platform. They tried to sell it in bulk. None of this makes sense for the product and the team responsible for it knows it will never work.
I'm mostly retired from a lifetime as a graphics programmer and CTO, and now I'm working through my lifetime of fun backlog projects. https://pcons.org, https://deep-timeline.org, https://pelorus-nav.com, https://packzen.org, https://github.com/garyo/sea-surface-temp-viz, https://globe-viz.oberbrunner.com/ and lots more. All open source and free.
Sure, make money from software. I did. But when you have enough and it's time to give back, open source it.
Great read, explains the issues I have with modern software well. As a matter of fact I am planning to release an App on the Google Playstore just so my mom can use it and has an easier time of installing it. The server is about 15€/month but I dont really care about the expenses. I just want her to have an easier time.
I'm doing exactly this. I started out only intending to create something for myself. As it got better, I thought that other people might want to use it. I briefly considered trying to sell it, and pretty quickly realized that I didn't want to ruin something I was having fun with by turning it into a business.
Now, instead of worrying about sales, I get to feel good about giving something back to the FOSS community that has given me so much.
I recognize that it is a position of privilege to be able to dedicate so much of my time to a project that gives me nothing financially... and in fact costs me money to produce. No shade at all to people who are not so lucky and need to sell what they make.
Anyway, if you're interested, here's what I'm working on. Feature-wise it's come a long way since the last HN post about it.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46619391
And if you're not interested, that's OK, because I'm not trying to sell you anything!
This has always confounded me when presented as a first choice when developing something with value. I can't think of any other fields with so much practical value where all participants are practically shamed for not giving away something that is identical to their most commercially valuable skill.
Most of my life has been financed by closed source products I developed on my own to fill a real need and others had it too. Had I given them away, the best I could have hoped for was what, a job offer?
I wonder if you'd also be arguing for libre software to reject available funding? What's the difference?
The Ruby on Rails foundation brings in a million per year: https://rubyonrails.org/foundation
The Linux foundation is funded at around $250m / year from a quick Google search
It's easy to have that view when giving away something not that many people are interested in. Once you're a platform full of media, entertainment and social connection you have to find a way to keep serving billions of users.
That's completely and absolutely fine, if you are millionaire and/or have other well paid job then.. well done, congratulations and enjoy your newly found hobby.
BUT - I'm capable to tinker with my car a bit, to service and repair my bike, to bake a bread - BUT I'm not visiting mechanic shops, bike service shops and bakeries in my city telling owners that they should work for free and give away results of their work.
I love the attitude, but this particular service in 2026 is a little risky.
A whole range of content can be posted that can make you liable that you want it or not... from product keys, to internal documents, ...
I'll just say this, I love the spirit but this is ballsy. It's just going to be used as another user-paste space.
I have taken a road somewhere between FOSS and paid software. I have a data management system that has been in a 'free open beta' for a few years now. Anyone can download it and try it for free.
Right now it can be used as a great tool or analyzing data. Feedback is appreciated but not expected. I try to respond to bug fixes and feature requests in a timely manner, but I am not required to do that.
If it catches on, I might charge something like $10 for an individual lifetime license. Businesses might be on some kind of subscription.
All my personal software is MIT licensed. Selling software isn't my bag, baby.
One of the room elephants: Most free software projects will have 0 users beyond the author.
As this is FOSS, I don't see why you need the security review (by who, with what qualifications?). Any users can look at the source code and arrange their own reviews as they think necessary.
I would love to write open source software for a living. So far, I haven't worked out how.
With AI it feels writing software that is open is less attractive. It's hard to trust OSS made recently b/c you can tell if someone knows what they're doing and even spent any time on quality. Also, often times people don't reach for software others make (unless it's boring and old stuff, in which case this advice doesn't apply.)
All my publicly available code on GitHub dot com is available for free for anyone to clone and copy.
What is not free is my time, my attention, and support. I don't know how open source maintainers do it but I can't imagine doing it for free.
Everyone is commenting on the blog but not the service. I remain skeptical:
A. Either it will remain obscure and not see any real use
B. (Less likely) It will get abused to hell before it is shutdown.
Claims of removing violating content “immediately” seem unrealistic under decent usage, unless that $600 can grow unbounded.
This is why I'm building free "spite apps" in homage to Larry David's spite stores [0]. The goal being to push back on enshitification of tech and dark patterns like mandatory subscriptions, ads and user data tracking.
As a solo indie-dev, writing free software (as in you don't need to pay anything) is fine, but I usually do not make the project (entirely) open source due to the added churn & maintenance.
In my experience, setting expectations early in my apps ("I'm a solo indie dev", "this is a free app", "you can reach out to me through email but don't expect super quick responses") helped reduce entitled users and - quite the opposite - people were super happy to get replies from me solving their problems.
[0] Blog post about it: https://sxp.studio/blog/spite-apps-the-latte-larrys-of-apps
The final three paragraphs really struck a chord with me. Nicely said. Thanks!
Wish there was a way to send this to every mobile dev who thinks they can (and should) charge a subscription for their hobby app that provides a basic function
I don’t need money but I run some moderately successful open source projects. The users are very demanding.
i do it here https://github.com/agentify-sh/
but have no idea how to get any compensation
i just do it because i use these tools and like to share it
> Debian-based Linux (Raspberry Pi OS, KDE Neon, Pop_OS, etc. - not Ubuntu)
Why not Ubuntu?
Hey author, thank you for blocking text selection on your site!
Do you mind describing why?
I always hoped that AI would enable people to take paid software and remake it so they could give it away for free. I started developing websites about 20 years ago back then apart from the big name software and Ide’s. Everything was free. Nowadays everything is a subscription.
I just did this for a MacOS+iOS universal app that lets you take quick notes - and keeps them in Markdown files on your Mac's filesystem (so agents can parse them)
> It cost about $600 USD to release, mostly due to two initial security reviews.
Can someone expand on this? I've given software away free and it didn't cost me anything.
if putting a subscription is considered enshittification, can the OP kindly enlighten me on how I am supposed to pay my bills while offering value?
This is the reason why developers here are upset about AI. You can't have it both ways and 'open source' is now weaponized against them.
AI will consume OSS software and anyone will be able to clone your closed-source app for free and open source it for 'the community' to avoid paying $1 to maintain it.
One thing that is not free is hosting.
part 3. dont maintain it. do point in time stuff
Still doing that :)
A long time ago, I wrote a small MS-DOS program that I gave away for free. Last I heard someone as of 2 or 3 years ago someone was still using it. It was a .com program.
even better is to grow with your users, monetize ethically, and make a lot of money anyway simply by being very big and through other routes like enterprise
i have never understood this idea applying to all sofware. sure general research level software should be free and open source. business logic or specific use cases should not. The law is free and open source. Lawyers will not draft you a contract for free. Medicine is free and open source. A doctor will not set your arm for free. FOSS is kind of the worst of both worlds. Unfunded or corporately funded amateurs give away poorly executed sofware that should be standardized basic research while also creating a race to the bottom in specific applications. Locking out true innovation because the reward for monetization is not there. In other words FOSS acts like a non-profit monopolist: restricts production and quality by dumping free software on the market. Anyone who thinks linux is a paragon of quality needs some perspective, or that rust multi gig builds are efficient. essentially foss is the wikipedization of software.
To repurpose a quote from Walt Disney, I don’t make software to make money, I make money to make more software.
I want my hobby project to be my job, because I don’t want to work for someone else. I want creative control, freedom to explore and ship ideas, and financial stability.
The only way to get there, that I can see, is to charge for my work.
What a really encouraging article!
To see a millennial generations person write about developing software that you want or need, and then let other people run that software.
I know these words aren't allowed on HN, but this idea was originally known as the "free software movement".
The idea is that individuals and institutions than need or want certain software, develop the software, and then share it, binary and source.
You add to this the concept of "copyleft", which requires that any change to the software, that is distributed, must also be shared with others, and you have the GPL license.
Businesses, schools, agencies, need email, browsers, accounting, instead of paying for these, what if the people who need them develop than, and share the results?
> it really does turn your passion from something that you actively seek out because you enjoy it, to something that you seek out because you want to meet a quota or turn a profit. You're always chasing the next quarter or the next thousand customers.
Those changes in motivation that came from monetizing the software are exactly what happens to "free software" that transitions to "open source". Developed for profit, not for use.
Again, it's really really encouraging to see a thinking person rediscover this concept.
I've been doing this at my co-op, just as a kind of, I don't know, break from capitalism or something? Or maybe to practice getting users before finding a monetizable project? Most are rinky dink derp projects to let co-op members play around with whatever stack, or to give potential members a project they can get a commit on (requirement to join), but some I think are kinda useful. Some I use every day, like the calorie one.
None of these run ads or make any money so I'm going to share them guiltlessly:
https://calories.508.dev just a simple average calorie tracker over months. I couldn't find anything like this online or on the app store.
https://travelcards.508.dev Generate printable cards with localized allergies or whatever for trips. Apparently a lot of our wedding guests like this. https://github.com/508-dev/travel-cards
http://stuff4friends.508.dev A stuff library for your friends to borrow stuff you aren't using. I'm most excited about this one right now because I have so much stuff, and my friends seem to be enjoying borrowing random stuff they wouldn't have just because they can see it and know it's all being tracked. https://github.com/508-dev/friend-library
Free software vs paid software - doesn't even matter right now.
What matters is: billionaires and capital have full control, and increasingly more, of everything in our lifes. Throwing tantrums won't help either. What you need to do as a programmer is to get involved in social movements and politics and fight to change the world and to effectively shape the social adoption of new technologies.
Truth is most programmers were always mediocre. And most acted like they were superior to others - not strange with the high pays and utter success of ideology. Glad that's about to end.
If your imagination was ripped completely already, all I can say is: rip. You have the option to cry for the next years, and complain online, like a child, or you can step up your game - and make it multiplayer instead of this sad sad singleplayer.
Current society is devastating both the planet and crushing our souls. According to the most popular topic on HN of the last few days, most users from this bubble can't even talk to other people (calling them "strangers"). Sorry to say, but fuck your FOSS or your expert software - this is utter failure as humans. If we can't fix that, among other things, we're absolutely doomed.
Across the decades of my career in high-tech, I found that repeating the pattern of "Create something you're personally passionate about, then give it away" has directly led to quite remarkable success - not every time, but a surprising amount. Admittedly, I found this out accidentally, since at first it wasn't exactly by choice. It was just what ended up happening after all my original plans failed miserably :-)
While I agree with OP about not always turning hobby or passion projects into businesses, I also realize some HNers may be closer to where I started, as a broke teenager with no degree, no job and no skills, than where I am today, recently retired and looking back on a fairly notable career as an 'accidental' serial tech entrepreneur. So, if you really need the money and/or hate your day job, why shouldn't you try to monetize any project you can? After all, these days everyone's got a side hustle (and 'passive income' was the success-porn meme before that).
Honestly, if you really need to, then go for the money but if you can afford to not go for every dollar early on in an emerging niche, sometimes playing the longer game can work out better. And not only financially, but in other ways like personal development, valuable relationships, practical experience and industry insight. And even in cases where your investment of time and energy doesn't appear to pay off in any tangible way, not turning it into a side hustle can preserve the sense of joy and personal satisfaction you get from it. And the older I get, the more I appreciate just how rare and fleeting that innate joy can be.
So at the end of the day, even if it doesn't go anywhere, not monetizing a passion project costs you maybe a few hundred dollars? I don't really count all the hours because, let's be real, if you're counting hours (instead of hiding them from yourself) it's not really a passion project. And in terms of effort and energy, I've always found doing stuff that feeds my soul tends to renew more than it consumes. So, full disclosure: N=1... but, over the years, most of the things I was unhealthily obsessed about to the extent I poured myself into them with wild abandon - ended up working out extremely well, despite usually having little apparent financial upside at the start. And, being obsessed, I rarely ever paused long enough to worry how much money I would make. To be fair, the 'big win' didn't always come right away but... too often to just be random, it would happen within a couple years - and more than once in life-changing amounts.
To be clear, I don't think there's anything metaphysical or 'woo' about this pattern. It just seems to activate disparate things which each nudge my cumulative odds toward positive outcomes. One unexpected factor was how people responded so strongly to what I was doing because they saw my 'non-mercenary' passion. So much so, that nowadays I tell young entrepreneurs "If you create enough value for people around a real and interesting problem, you won't be able to stop them throwing money at you" by which I mean, over-achieve on creating uniquely transformative value first and if you do that well enough, collecting the money gets a lot easier.
There's also an interesting filter effect around emerging passion niches which are outside the mainstream. In the early days of a new thing, most people don't 'get it' but when you impulsively leap into it because YOU can't stop thinking about it every waking moment (and not because TechCrunch said VCs are funding it), then if you have a sharp eye and good instincts, that can put you near ground zero of the next 'next big thing' before the funding cycle starts.
Sometimes the most valuable part of being on the ground floor in the early days is it attracts others who are smart and have good instincts about cool new things. And in the early days, new communities are still small enough that high-quality individual contributions get noticed by everyone - especially when passionately inspired and freely given. Just look at the careers of the random teens who squandered any hope of dating or sports in high school to waste thousands hours on the demo scene in the 90s. While I wasn't part of the demo scene, I was attracted to a couple similar ground zero tech niches in the 90s and it's spooky how many people I met back 'in the day' because we were all doing 'the best' stuff out of the few hundred people on Earth doing this stuff at all, were people who've gone on to become founders of well-known startups, senior fellows at Google or to invent some fundamental part of what's in my pocket right now. And none of the "cool things" my teenage daughter is impressed I was involved in creating before she was born are things I pursued with a monetization plan or after careful analysis of the TAM (to be honest, I'd already done two startup exits and was a week from my first IPO when I had to ask one of my investment bankers what "TAM" stood for).
The obvious counter-argument is "Cool story, boomer... sadly, the days when a tech nerd could succeed by running toward whatever new thing seemed cool and then naively giving away their time and talent are long gone." And maybe that's true. But today doesn't really feel different. Back then a lot of nice, more experienced people warned me I was wasting my time and talent or that I was being taken advantage of. They were wisely monetizing their time and talent toward a carefully laid plan while I was off experimenting with stuff that didn't even work yet, making toys no one would pay for and spending long nights helping people who couldn't pay me just because I thought the thing we were making was super-cool. While the wise and prudent people with a plan got paid for every single hour - somehow I ended up with generational wealth and most of them didn't. Yeah, maybe it's survivorship bias and in an alternate universe, some other version of me did just waste his time, get taken advantage of and end up nowhere. But here's the thing. Even if I ended up scraping a workaday living together for my whole career and retired after a series of "almost made it" products with nothing but a half-funded 401k, - I still wouldn't trade it. The amazing people and experiences I had and all the joy from creating new things that so inspired me I literally couldn't sleep at night was still worth doing even without the big payday at the end. And maybe that's the difference between fake passion and the real thing.
So I guess, my story is only for the crazy fools and dreamers that old Apple ad was talking to. If what I wrote kind of resonates with you but you also worry about being a chump and taken advantage of - know that there's a version of this story where following your passions and giving stuff away, at least for a little while in the early days of a new thing, ends up working out stupidly well - as long as you're smart, do great work and, of course, actually take care of the business end when the ground floor turns into a skyscraper. Now you just need to decide if you're living in the universe you were made for.
Or don't. I've done both, published OSS projects and sold some software. The level of entitlement in some comments I received on the OSS side was pretty crazy at times. While with the paid software, all of the interactions I had were so much more constructive. YMMV, but willingness to pay is a great filter.