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Posts: 307 | Thanked: 1,460 times | Joined on May 2011 @ Switzerland
#16
Originally Posted by MartinK View Post
As I've already mentioned a few times, you can still license stuff software with a 100% codebase by licensing your trademarks and artwork. You can also sell support for your software, get money for new features, for certifications, hardware support, etc. Your code is still fully open, people can send you patches and you are not alienating your community. There are companies using this formula rather successfully.

Not saying that Jolla is willing and prepared to do it like this, just that it is possible to license & earn money with what is effectively 100% open source software.
You don't even need the trademarks really. You can give people access to your source without giving them the legal right to use it in their own products, even if they build it themselves. Licensing is a separate thing. Plus there are other things of value that Jolla would be selling to device manufacturers, like support for their hardware and training for their developers. I really hope they can pull this off.
 

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