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Negotiating Pay for Open Source Work?

Posted by Cliff on from the don't-forget-to-read-your-contracts dept.

OpenSourceforMoney asks: "For about nine months now I've been working on an Open Source software project; the first release was five months ago. It's reasonably popular given its age -- several hundred users at least (users, not downloads) -- but despite my best attempts, I've been unable to get even a few dollars in donations to help support this (and being a student, I really need to get some money from somewhere). Now suddenly I've been approached by a company which wants to pay me to continue working on this project. How should I handle this? Should I ask for an hourly rate, or should I come up with specific targets and attach prices to each? How much money is it reasonable to ask for, for doing work which I'd end up doing (albeit more slowly) even if I wasn't getting paid? How have Slashdot readers handled the transition from working on a project for fun to being paid to work on it?"

10 of 458 comments (clear)

  1. Business plan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    1. Start open source project.
    2. Ask slashdot why I'm not getting paid.
    3. ???
    4. Profit!

    1. Re:Business plan by iabervon · · Score: 4, Funny

      3. Get approached by a company willing to pay you

  2. Gotta make money! by DrFlex · · Score: 0, Funny


    Foschizzle!

  3. simple by civilengineer · · Score: 4, Funny

    just send invoices to you clients for $699. Some of them will pay without bothering to find out what they are paying for.

    --

    New year Resolution: Don't change sig this year
  4. Project price only by ryanh50 · · Score: 5, Funny

    You should bid the project out in it's entirety then sub-contract it to india for 1/5 what they are paying you.
    They get their project
    Some indian Programmer gets paid a great wage for his market
    You get your cut and can do something else :) EVERYBODY WINS!!!!! :)

  5. Re:My employer pays for me to write code. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    What the hell makes you think people are going to pay for you to write open source software?

    Umm, maybe a company that told him that they want to pay him?

  6. Find a comfortable rate. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    If you release your work under the GPL, divide it by 2. If it works on Linux only, and requires extensive patching to run elsewhere, divide again by 2. If you have a stallman-like beard, multiply by 2 and give the now-gained half to the barber's shop.

  7. Re:a good price by smallfeet · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wow, trash men get paid $9 an hour where I am ... oh wait, you did say Microsoft COM+

  8. Re:If it were me by Skip+Head · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...the original perl source was deliberately obfuscated...

    I was just wondering...

    How could you tell?

    --
    Most evil is done by good people, and not by accident, but deliberately; motivated by high ideals toward virtuous ends.
  9. Re:a good price by holzp · · Score: 2, Funny

    $25 an hour! Where are you some sort of programmers mecca? I'll do it for $2.50 an hour, no benefits!
    - Random Outsourcer, India