[HN Gopher] All Your Licensing Are Belong to Us^W You
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All Your Licensing Are Belong to Us^W You
Author : ezekg
Score : 15 points
Date : 2023-06-01 15:25 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (keygen.sh)
(TXT) w3m dump (keygen.sh)
| lfconsult wrote:
| Great news! Congratulations for open sourcing it! Hope the best
| for the future.
|
| Edit: I'm a happy user ;-)
| mook wrote:
| It looks like they very carefully did not claim it to be open
| source :)
|
| As somebody who typically dislikes the Elastic license, this is
| really a great use of it:
|
| - it used to be completely closed source, so it's not taking
| any previous contributions and putting a more restrictive
| license on it;
|
| - there is clearly quite a bit of thought in choosing this
| license over something like AGPL (complete with somebody taking
| to themselves on GitHub), and the license was chosen based on
| the goals;
|
| - the software in question is really not that useful for non-
| commercial uses anyway, so people who want to freeload doesn't
| have that much to stand on
|
| Even though I'm not a user (and don't see myself using it in
| the future), I'd nevertheless be happy for them and hope they
| do well :)
| burnte wrote:
| They explicitly used the phrase "keygen is now open source".
| Tenth sentence overall, 6th paragraph from the top:
|
| "After 7 years of being closed source, I'm incredibly excited
| to announce that Keygen is now open source! Let's unpack what
| that means for us and for you."
|
| Open source doesn't mean Free Software.
| semireg wrote:
| I started my indie electron app a year after Keygen started. I
| looked at Keygen when I launched a version of my app off the app
| stores. I needed a way to license and have complete control.
|
| At the time, Keygen didn't do everything I needed (but it
| probably does now), so I'm not a user. However, I've always
| looked at Keygen and its solo dev with great respect. I just knew
| that we were going to be successful in our niches and although we
| haven't helped each other with direct product offerings, just
| know that Keygen made me feel like I could do anything.
|
| Because we are talking license servers ... My license server is
| node+mongo and vends licenses as JWT. My desktop app verifies the
| JWT and uses the payload to unlock features. They work offline.
| Pretty slick! I'm proud of what we've built. Truly standing on
| the shoulders of giants.
|
| Best of luck on your open sourcing of Keygen! Let me know if
| you're ever in the Midwest USA and we can grab a meal or beverage
| together.
| ezekg wrote:
| > ...although we haven't helped each other with direct product
| offerings, just know that Keygen made me felt like I could do
| anything
|
| Incredibly humbled to hear that. Sometimes it's quiet and
| lonely as a solo founder, and this comment brought me joy. So
| thanks for sharing.
|
| Today is a big change, but I'm excited (even if my hands have
| been shaking all day).
| kayson wrote:
| If you're using electron... what's to stop someone from just
| modifying the client side JavaScript to circumvent the
| licensing?
| semireg wrote:
| Not a ton, I suspect. On macOS there'd be app
| signing/notarizing issues and you'd probably have to disable
| gate keeper or knock another hole in the walled garden.
|
| The real "trick" is keeping the app inexpensive and the
| purchase low friction. If I raised prices there'd be more
| pressure to pirate. People who need my app are solving a
| "terrible problem" (printing labels). They aren't the kind of
| customer that would seek out a pirated copy or try to pirate
| it.
|
| For example, for a period of time the app's licensing could
| be bypassed by starting another 14 day free trial using a
| different email address. After watching these "clones" keep
| re-registering every two weeks (for maybe 20 weeks!), I
| finally updated the licensing to be slightly more
| restrictive: you can register again but the 2nd free trial on
| any particular computer is limited to 4 hours, the 3rd
| registration doesn't show a free trial.
|
| Guess what happened? ~50 new customers over two weeks, all
| from a particular geography. It was wild. But I've had no
| complaints.
|
| Long story short: People will pay to solve the soul-crushing
| task of label printing. I joke that I write the colonoscopy
| of the software world. It can be a dirty job.
| kayson wrote:
| Thanks for the insight!
| ezekg wrote:
| Founder here! Big shift.
|
| Happy to take any feedback or answer questions.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| A legit incredible journey! Well done.
| [deleted]
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(page generated 2023-06-01 23:02 UTC)