To be clear, I’m not looking to make any meaningful money off my own project (which is “just” a dashboard).
But if we want self-hosted software to become a real alternative to commercial services, we need people, especially developers, to care enough to build and maintain it.
Sure, AI is changing things. It’s easier than ever to build your own software, but even with AI, I wouldn’t be able to replace all the online services I use. And I doubt most people would either. Building something is one thing, maintaining it over the years is another. It’s still a serious amount of free time to dedicate to something.
What actually got me thinking about this was Heaper, a self-hosted cloud alternative that uses CRDTs. I’d really like to see it succeed because it’s doing something genuinely different from what’s already out there.
And I think those are exactly the kinds of projects we should be supporting. Software that offers real value in everyday use and gives people a reason to move away from commercial services.
But relying on donations clearly isn’t enough to sustain development for most projects. Providing a hosted version does conflict with the main idea of a service being self-hosted.
Then there are apps like Plex, which keep raising their subscription prices. At some point, you have to wonder what the financial benefit of self-hosting even is if every service comes with another subscription.
I’m not saying self-hosting always needs to be cheaper. I’m fine with paying for good software, especially if it supports the people developing it. But part of the appeal of self-hosting is having control over your own services without having to worry about a growing list of recurring bills.
Larger open-source projects can sometimes fund development through business licenses or public funding, but that doesn’t necessarily work for smaller projects.
I don’t really have a solution here. I just think we need better ways to financially support the developers building software we actually want to use, without turning self-hosting into another collection of subscriptions.
What do you think would be a reasonable way to fund these projects?
I’m the lead dev at my job. I started using a self hosted software because it was available to me without asking for budget. We used it for about 8 months and during budgeting, I decided to add this self hosted software to my teams budget because the self hosted software grew to the point where I didn’t want to manage it anymore.
You have correctly identified the core issue with open source.
Personally speaking, as inefficient as it is, I think that donations is the best way to support a self hosted open source project.
Followed by paying for licensing to be able to get support for the product.
If your project is open source any other restriction out there, you can’t really do because they can just fork and patch the software to remove the restriction.
Due to that restriction(or lack of), I’ve always personally seen open-source projects to be more of a hobbyist or personal project then a project that someone wants to do to make money.
First find a way to track your costs. Measure how much it costs to give it away (to your self and people that support you starting it as a buisness). Do market analysis based on those number. How much do you need to support both your operatiinal costs of hosting and devoloper time paid with a fair wage, and what does compare to how much consumers are currently paying. If that looks good invest in an accountant and lawyer to see what the buisness plan viability might look like and set up a LLC. From there look for partners that can help you create a sustainable buisness and fill in skill gaps you dont have, or hire out the rest.
Thats it.
Even better make it a community coop so that the skilled labor and community can have actual ownership in the org to help balance out thr risk and encourage litteral buyin.
The classic approach to this is running a business that offers hosted versions of the self-hosted technology for a price, and offers documentation for self-hosting the stack on the same page. Users click the button for what they want.
And the business offers support contracts for a price. A business can buy these so if they run into an issue they can contact you directly to help resolve the issue. Some of these support contracts go further to allow feature requests and you they pay you for new things for that business.
Europe is increasingly funding projects through NGOs and government foundations. If FOSS software is a public good, then we should devote public funds to it.
Some projects offer paid hosting for those who can’t or don’t wasn’t to self-host. Some (particularly mobile apps) push a paid version to stores to subsidize those using FOSS sources to download.
