ZpqrtBnk General License

NOTE: the ZpqrtBnk General License experiment has been terminated on Oct. 29, 2019. This page is obsolete and only maintained for reference.

As much as I love open software, the actual hours I spend coding and helping people for free are not feeding the family. In other words, I cannot afford free open software: there needs to be a sustainable way to do it.

One of the thing I do for money is develop and provide support around the Umbraco CMS. The ZpqrtBnk General License, introduced in this blog post, is the paperwork that makes it work.

How does it work?

Simple:

• Some users tell me that they want to purchase a license
• They decide the amount + payment details (monthly, quarterly, onetime...)
• I send them an invoice from my company
• They pay the invoice
• They are on the list: they have the moral right to use my tools
• I develop and support the Umbraco CMS and associated tools

Questions

What kind of money are we talking about?

The goal is to raise approximatively EUR 10-12K every month.

In other words, 100-120 hours at EUR 100/hr or 12-15 days at 8 hr/day.

What do we get in return?

Licensees have the moral right to use the tools I release. Using the tools without a license is morally wrong. They can expect them to be maintained, bugs to be fixed, questions to be answered, and feature requests to be considered.

In addition, they ensure that I can keep improving people's Umbraco and .NET lives, be it on the community Slack, on Our, at meetups and festivals, or by fixing bugs, implementing features, etc.

What tools are we talking about?

At the moment, Models Builder. The CMS is soon going to ship with a built-in minimal version. I provide the full, maintained version. More tools are coming.

Isn't this a sort of sponshorship?

Somehow. But IT department budgets & accountants like licenses way better than sponshorship.

Is this a Make Money Fast scheme? (making too much)

No. The goal is to maintain my income. The plan is to be transparent, so you know whether an effort is required or not.

What happens if it does not work? (making too little)

I cannot afford it: it's all-or-nothing. Plan B is stopping all activity and finding myself another role.

Do we get an invoice?

Yes, the ZpqrtBnk General License is bought from my registered french company, and you receive a PDF invoice by email.

EU citizens have to pay the 20% french VAT. EU companies can avoid the VAT by providing their VAT/tax-ID. People and companies outside EU pay no french VAT.

I have more questions

See the General License Questions page. Maybe you will find the answer there. Otherwise, ping me on Twitter!

Contact

How can we reach you?

See my company contact page.