Fw: Question about how to make a living from open source

[tzahi ml]

Hi Shlomi,
As always, thanks for the comprehensive tips.

A big question that troubles me is if you have to always incorporate for a
cloud/on premise business.
The last incorporation (i am now closing) was costly but the lawyers keep
pushing you to incorporate (hopefully not from a self serving interest).
On one hand, I am currently an independent and I would prefer to stay this
way until the cash justifies an incorporation. OTOH, I want to keep my bank
account safe from law-suites as much as possible.

Would love to hear comments about this...

Thanks!

On Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 11:50 AM, Shlomi Fish <shlomif at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Shlomi Fish <shlomif at shlomifish.org>
> Date: Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 11:49 AM
> Subject: Fw: Question about how to make a living from open source
> To: shlomif at gmail.com
>
>
>
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
> Date: Sun, 21 Sep 2014 11:48:01 +0300
> From: Shlomi Fish <shlomif at shlomifish.org>
> Cc: "linux-il at cs.huji.ac.il" <linux-il at cs.huji.ac.il>
> Subject: Re: Question about how to make a living from open source
>
>
> Hi Tzahi,
>
> On Thu, 18 Sep 2014 14:15:40 +0300
> tzahi ml <tzahi.ml at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hi All,
> > I am in need of assistance.
> >
> > I am currently working as a freelancer coding stuff in a company.
> > However, although I am making good living, this does not scale much (and
> > promotion is out of the question :) ).
> >
> > Anyway, I am looking for ways to scale.
> >
>
> I've written about some business models for web-based publishing here:
>
> https://plus.google.com/+ShlomiFish/posts/MRLntf3xu5Y
>
> Some of them have correspondence to open source. See:
>
> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
> Alternative profitable business models for Web-based commerce.
>
> This is a list of 5 business models for web-based commerce that do not
> require
> depending on advertising:
>
>
> 1. Collect donations or ask for money for public appearances in advance -
> see
> https://plus.google.com/+ShlomiFish/posts/GUpTuA6641x .
>
> 2. The Flickr model - charge people for a premium model.
>
> 3. The Bandcamp/Humble-Bundle model - pay what you want (people can be very
> generous).
>
> 4. The cloud model - pay for hosting or a MMORPG account
> (World-of-Warcraft/etc.) or whatever.
>
> 5. Pay to liberate - collect money to make a CC-by-nc-sa work CC-by/etc.
>
> 6. Sell merchandise - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNZove4OTtI .
>
> 7. One can also set up non-intrusive ads like those provided by
> http://projectwonderful.com/ , but I doubt they'll be profitable.
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>
> Another suggestion I can give you is to work a lot on publicity, social
> networking, etc. - both in real life and in Internet-based social media
> venues.
>
> See:
>
>
> http://www.reddit.com/r/Objectivism/comments/2c1fue/the_importance_of_human_networking/
>
> A chauffeur with whom I stroke a conversation at a McDonalds restaurant
> close to
> Heathrow airport in London told me he now gets most of his customers from
> social media outlets such as Facebook or Twitter. The newfound
> possibilities
> from real-life and electronic social networking are very much reflected in
> stories here:
>
> * http://www.shlomifish.org/humour/Buffy/A-Few-Good-Slayers/
>
> There are plenty of online communities for various topics on the Internet.
> Find some of them that you are interested in and contribute to them. There
> are
> Reddit subreddits, wikis (Wikipedia, Wikia wikis, etc.), IRC channels on
> Freenode/etc., Facebook groups and pages, Twitter feeds, mailing lists,
> etc.
> and you should be able to contribute to some of them.
>
> The greatest threat for any business is obscurity.
>
> You may also wish to invest some money in buying ads, commercials,
> promotions or whatever - nothing wrong with that and this money may be well
> worth it in publicity.
>
> Finally note the Carpe Diem / "He who saved one man has essentially saved
> the
> world entire principle" - don't try to maximise your audience immediately.
> Invest time in each and every friend and recipient:
>
> * http://www.shlomifish.org/humour.html#carpe_diem
>
> Finally, I should note that your English does not sound idiomatic
> (although I
> admit I heard much worse). You should work on improving it. See my advice
> for
> how to do that here:
>
> *
> https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/hackers-il/conversations/messages/5143
>
> Regards,
>
>         Shlomi Fish
>
> --
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> Shlomi Fish       http://www.shlomifish.org/
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> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> Shlomi Fish       http://www.shlomifish.org/
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>
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> Hermione: Ahem… actually I kinda have a bad hair day today, so I think
> your assistant should be the beautiful Harry (Potter!) here.
> Harry: Very well, I shall be the beautiful assistant.
>     — http://is.gd/zsmond
>
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>
>
>
> --
> ------------------------------------------
> Shlomi Fish http://www.shlomifish.org/
>
> Chuck Norris helps the gods that help themselves.
>
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>
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