Immich Q&A ft. Eron Wolf & Louis Rossmann from Futo
www.youtube.com

Short version of this interview is that nothing is changing, other than they’re going to be asking a flat fee “$5-20” for the app, rather than relying on donations. All donation platforms have been closed. However, if you choose not to, as Louis says “that’s between you and your God”.

Project will remain AGPL and thus can be forked at any time. FUTO maintains the trademark of Immich name and logos.

  • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.caEnglish
    24·
    6 months ago

    Weird feeling about this. $5-$20 flat fee sounds like a lower price than what I’d imagine donations would bring. I imagine most who would donate would give at least $5-20, and then some would subscribe monthly. The dev team is obviously gonna get funding from Eron for now which would likely be higher today than what they get in donations.

    • helenslunch@feddit.nlOPEnglish
      17·
      6 months ago

      Yeah I dunno. I sent them $50 as soon as I came across this amazing software.

      I think FUTO is trying to make FOSS sustainable by unmistakably asking for money. I’m not sure how much more effective that will be than just asking for donations externally…

      • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.caEnglish
        7·
        6 months ago

        Me too, I subbed for monthly.

        The one thing I can see FUTO can do is provide capital up front for developers to work which could be recouped over time as more users begin to use and pay for the software. That makes sense and in a competent, not neoliberal economy, the government might have a fund doing something like that. What I’m a bit worried about is that this might not be all Eron’s up to. But again, we’ll take his money when he gives it, so long as the work is open source. And we’ll see where we end up in a few years. 😅

        • twei@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
          5·
          6 months ago

          Germany has a fund like that, GNOME just recently got a grant of about 1M Euros to improve features and provide better accessibility

  • jvh@feddit.ukEnglish
    23·
    6 months ago

    I’m currently in the process of moving my family off of Google photos to Immich. Both my partner and I pay Google at the moment because we have to due to amount of photos. And that’s only going to increase.

    Immich is great but there are also a lot of bugs. The shared albums that my wider family use for example is very buggy. So paying an amount that I might have paid Google for those bugs to be fixed while self hosting I would be very happy with I think.

    However, I was thinking of attacking those bugs myself and contributing bug fixes to the project. But what happens now that it’s a commercial product essentially? Will they still accept code from pull requests from outside their organisation? Will any devs who spend a lot of time contributing get anything for their work? E.g. if I was providing time and code for a product then had to pay to use it that might seem a bit mean.

    • helenslunch@feddit.nlOPEnglish
      101·
      6 months ago

      Will they still accept code from pull requests from outside their organisation?

      That’s answered in the video. Nothing is changing. Yes, they still accept contributions.

      Will any devs who spend a lot of time contributing get anything for their work? E.g. if I was providing time and code for a product then had to pay to use it that might seem a bit mean.

      That’s the way it’s worked since day 1.

      • jvh@feddit.ukEnglish
        8·
        6 months ago

        Will they still accept code from pull requests from outside their organisation?

        That’s answered in the video. Nothing is changing. Yes, they still accept contributions.

        OK cool, I missed that bit. I’ve found it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwz2iZwYpgg&t=1960s

        Will any devs who spend a lot of time contributing get anything for their work? E.g. if I was providing time and code for a product then had to pay to use it that might seem a bit mean.

        That’s the way it’s worked since day 1.

        It wasn’t a commercially backed product since day 1. This is more of a general question I guess… how does this work for open source projects like Immich when it’s commercially backed where there are some developers paid to work on it, but other developers contributing of their own accord. Would they receive some sort of benefit for having worked on it. E.g. not have to pay for using the product they’ve worked on perhaps if they meet a threshold of having contributed enough to it? I just wonder how that tends to work for open source projects which are also commercial in nature.

        • myliltoehurts@lemm.eeEnglish
          5·
          6 months ago

          I have never seen contributors get anything for open source contributions.

          In larger, more established projects, they explicitly make you sign an agreement that your contributions are theirs for free (in the form of a github bot that tells you this when you open a PR). Sometimes you get as much as being mentioned in a readme or changelog, but that’s pretty much it.

          I’m sure there may be some examples of the opposite, I just… Wouldn’t hold my breath for it in general.

        • helenslunch@feddit.nlOPEnglish
          13·
          6 months ago

          Open source has a long history of commercial backing. Ever heard of a little project called NextCloud? Matrix? Nothing changes. It all works the same way, because it’s still AGPL license.

          • jvh@feddit.ukEnglish
            21·
            6 months ago

            So with the android app, they said they would charge for that. But I guess the .apk would be on Github but you’d pay if you installed it from the app store?

  • JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nlEnglish
    213·
    6 months ago

    What is Futo? Their website says absolutely nothing besides their “company values.”

    What is their business model?

    Who is running it?

    How do they earn money to give out?

    What do they ask in return besides hoarding the trademarks?

    Flat fee is always good, but I am always skeptical about these sort of completely opaque, altruistic companies that often turn into not-so-altruistic companies after they see more profit capabilities.

    • acockworkorange@mander.xyzEnglish
      6·
      6 months ago

      What is their business model?

      Selling free software without enforcing it.

      How do they earn money to give out?

      See above.

      What do they ask in return besides hoarding the trademarks?

      Cash.

  • RegalPotoo@lemmy.worldEnglish
    16·
    6 months ago

    Seems pretty reasonable. At the end of the day people have to eat, so projects like this either trundle on as hobby-and-spare-time projects for a few years until people get bored and burnt out, or you find a way to make working on the project a paid gig for the core people

  • RBG@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    10·
    6 months ago

    Flat fee is good. If its subscription I am hoping for forks.

    Edit: also, I don’t care what they say they plan to do. In the end actions matter. They can say now its just a small flat fee but 6 months in they can change their mind and make the crappiest micro transaction model they can think of.

  • ReallyActuallyFrankenstein@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
    8·
    6 months ago

    From their website: https://futo.org/what-is-futo/

    What is FUTO? FUTO is an organization dedicated to developing, both through in-house engineering and investment, technologies that frustrate centralization and industry consolidation.

    Ok… So what does that mean?

    Through a combination of in-house engineering projects, targeted investments, generous grants, and multi-media public education efforts, we will free technology from the control of the few and recreate the spirit of freedom, innovation, and self-reliance that underpinned the American tech industry only a few decades ago.

    FUTO is not reliant on any existing tech company or venture capital firm for its funding. We are not expecting quick profits. We will never cash out with a sale to a megacorporation the moment our technology begins to catch on. We will focus entirely on the mission.

    If you share these goals, either as a user or a developer, we ask you to watch this space and get ready to throw off the stultifying limitations of the current state of affairs. We want to return to an era where a substantial portion of computer users can understand, control, and use their technology as they see fit without the approval or input of oligarchs. And we need your help.

    Ok so… What does that mean?

    Maybe the OP’s video explains these things (I hate watching videos for things like this), but I really thought I’d be able to find an explanation, in practical terms, of what this organization actually does on their own website.

  • h3ndrik@feddit.deEnglish
    6·
    6 months ago

    Most important thing with FUTO is, they learn how to do open source and engage with a community. Maybe it helps if they adopt a few projects with existing communities and which are more than source available.

  • geography082@lemm.eeEnglish
    218·
    6 months ago

    I saw it comming. The development was on steroids the last months, so it was all arranged. This piss me off.