From: Chad Perrin Date: 2007-07-24T05:38:19+09:00 Subject: Re: Ruby Editor On Mon, Jul 23, 2007 at 10:39:59PM +0900, bgulian@gmail.com wrote: > On Jul 23, 4:22 am, Alex Young wrote: > > >For example, free the software, > > charge for service. It seems to work for (at least) Red Hat and MySQL. > > How long did it take these two companies to get off some sort of > patronage and start making money? I'm not sure, and it's really not relevant to the point. The point is that there's a viable business model here -- and, in fact, because the revenue needs of a smaller project are less than those of a larger business like Red Hat and MySQL, you could probably become profitable somewhat more quickly as an individual developer than trying to leap immediately into something the current size of Red Hat. > > Still, let's say I've got this great little editor called TextBuddy I > want to get off the ground. How do any of these models, including the > kickbacks from Google mentioned later in this thread apply to me? As already pointed out, there's not as much opportunity for filling a need with a text editor as with some other software types. TextMate was an exception because of the relatively new opportunity provided by MacOS X as a user environment (something like Vim doesn't really blend well with that environment, at least yet). In any case, anything other than the idea of using software to sell hardware, *all* of those revenue models apply to your example. For instance, Richard Stallman survived for years primarily on revenue generated through feature requests for Emacs. I'm sure that's at least part of the reason that Emacs is almost a credible OS replacement. All it's really missing is its own HAL and bootloader (it relies on those of the host OS instead). Ha ha, only serious. -- CCD CopyWrite Chad Perrin [ http://ccd.apotheon.org ] Dr. Ron Paul: "Liberty has meaning only if we still believe in it when terrible things happen and a false government security blanket beckons."