This is just standard small business practice. You have to have general liability insurance. Sorry if this issue blocks developers. Maybe you should appeal to the president or congress to get a waiver for program writers. Good f'n luck on that.

Most people I suspect who see this thread look at the phrase "$1 million insurance required" and assume it means the developer has to have $1 million in their bank account. The actual cost of such insurance is closer to $1000 a year or something, isn't it?

And if someone was making money from their apps they could probably claim such costs back from the tax office, so it would cost them $0 in the end.

Not saying this is necessarily an acceptable situation, but it isn't quite as outrageous as the headline might suggest.

...and as many others have pointed out, you don't need to go through Ovi anyway. You can distribute apps to Nokia devices by third party channels or even set up your own distribution channel.

They can, but it would be rude if the developer has asked you not to, the price is low enough that everyone can afford it, and you didn't contribute anything of value.

Indeed, not just rude, but you might find if you keep doing that, that a promising project is abandoned, and nobody else takes it up. If that happens, you haven't done the community any favours. Of course it's hard to know the consequences without looking at the details of an individual project - which is why you should think before doing it, but be aware that you do have the right.

There's a difference between what's permitted by a license and what is polite/good.

The reason people use licenses which give you permission to fork and redistribute, even when they want you not to, is because they believe you should have that right if you need it, but would rather you choose not to exercise it without a good reason.

That's why when someone takes BSD-licensed code and wraps it in a GPL license, sometimes people get upset and say it's wrong (even though it's permitted), and other people say "but you explicitly let me do that!", followed by "if you didn't want me to do that, you should have used a different license!".

The latter people miss the point. Spelling out everything in a license cannot provide the subtlety of granting essential rights when needed while asking for thoughtful, mature discretion in deciding when to use those rights.

Yeah, it's permitted. Those rights are important. Developers choosing FOSS licenses know that; they aren't stupid. If you need to fork and redistribute, do it. Go ahead, it's permitted for a reason. But it's not always kind, smart or good for the community, so please be thoughtful when deciding whether doing it is a good idea in any particular circumstance.

If you do take a for-pay app which is under FOSS license and make it available gratis, perhaps because you know people who would benefit (perhaps it's too expensive), then at least have the courtesy to mention where it is sold by the developer, so that people receiving the app can make up their own mind about whether to reward the real developer(s) / fund it's continued development.

About open source software in Ovi, please check, discuss and vote the Brainstorm proposal

Open source software distributed via store.ovi.com

Discussion thread: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?p=385610

Well they had to pay 1000 for the insurance then they have to make 1000 to break even..... so after doing work valued at 1000 they have nothing to show for it.

Since the taxes are a percentage of the sales they would have to sell many times this cost to be able to get the original 1000 back from the tax man.....

It most definitely costs 1000 to get started. As code177 points out for him its about 500 still non trivial.

E

Ibelieve that is the point I was trying to make albeit with a tad more tact.

I'm sure I am not going to make any friends on this one but....

Welcome to the world of commercial development! All business ventures involve a level of outlay & risk: that is why corporations undertake some form of market research before investing in a project. I've seen plenty of ideas for projects come into my office but I've had to turn them down as not commercially viable. The occassional one we push through fully aware that it is a loss but one we calculated for.

Commercial development is about making money so that we can pay our bills which includes those of our development team. Some of these guys spend their own time working on community projects & I'm more than happy for them to use the facilities for this after sorting out rights waivers so no one can say the company has rights (or liabilities) for the project.

Basic summary is that if you want to charge for development then you also have to be prepared to pay for the pissed off customer that comes back wanting blood. They rarely have a reasonable moral case but often courts don't see it that way.

End Rant!

Sure. I was just trying to make people aware that there might not be a business model where they (try to) see one.

Very good post, by the way.

flames apart, real question, do you have to pay that insurance to sell on the apple apps store too? (in case they accept your software of course)
if not, why is it different with nokia?