Contractors and open source software

[Richard Gaskin]

Bob Sneidar wrote:

> The Community version license I think specifies that you cannot create
> software for resale, you have to purchase a commercial license, so you
> can't produce commercial software with Community without violating the
> license.
>
> I will be corrected if this is not the case.

Your friendly neighborhood FOSS curmudgeon at your service. :)

The GPL expresses no opinion about charging a price for software.  The
"free" in "Free Software" is about freedom: you are free to use the
software however you like, modify it however you like, and share the
modifications with anyone you like.

As a practical matter, though, Free Software is also usually given away
without cost. This is not a licensing requirement, but merely a
reflection of the economic reality at play: if your user has the right
to share the software with anyone at any price or no price at all, they
usually will, so you'd sell exactly one copy.

-- 
 Richard Gaskin
 Fourth World Systems
 Software Design and Development for the Desktop, Mobile, and the Web
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