awesome-oss-monetization

Monetization via Employment

Payment by getting hired from a company interested in the OSS - probably for business critical parts of their products. Employment might range from 100% to 20% work on the OSS. Employers might nudge the development into a direction that benefits them but hinders other companies / their competition. Often these are normal employments as on-site or remote developer but longer freelancing contracts are possible and generate mostly recurring income.

Requires:

Variants & Options:

Platforms

Evaluation

Characteristics Value Note
Effort to set-up Weeks Negotiating contract between different countries
Effort to maintain Low The contract could be terminated if OSS support is deemed no longer important
Cost to set-up None  
Cost to maintain None  
One-time Income Medium Only if freelancing for a solution / feature
Recurring Income Medium Probably in the range of a normal salary in the employer’s country
Income Predictability High Depends on the contract
Full income Threshold 1+  
Recipient I  
Additional Work Medium Might vary between 0 and 80% - depends other work for the company.
Visibility Low Notice on website to hire a maintainer are easy to overlook
Necessity to pay Low Complex contracts; Voluntary but might bring good PR to company
Entry Threshold Low Similar to other employees of the company
Countervalue Work  
Scalability None Probably one one employment possible (part-time or freelancing might be used)
Effort for marketing High Finding a 100% job is very hard; When working partially for company’s product is easier (due to War for Talents)
Competitors M Another maintainer might be a competior for a (remote) job
Software types All Â