{"id":31321,"date":"2017-02-13T18:43:57","date_gmt":"2017-02-13T23:43:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.opensource.im\/uncategorized\/free-as-in-puppy-the-hidden-costs-of-free-software-opensource-com.php"},"modified":"2017-02-13T18:43:57","modified_gmt":"2017-02-13T23:43:57","slug":"free-as-in-puppy-the-hidden-costs-of-free-software-opensource-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/open-source-software\/free-as-in-puppy-the-hidden-costs-of-free-software-opensource-com.php","title":{"rendered":"Free as in puppy: The hidden costs of free software &#8211; Opensource.com"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><p>About the author                                      Ben Cotton -              Ben Cotton is a              meteorologist by training and a high-performance              computing engineer by trade. Ben works as a technical              evangelist at Cycle Computing. He is a Fedora              user and contributor, co-founded a local open source              meetup group, and is a member of the Open Source              Initiative and a supporter of Software Freedom              Conservancy. Find him on Twitter (@FunnelFiasco) or at                                                                                  <\/p>\n<p>              We're used to hearing of software being described as              \"free as in freedom\" and \"free as in beer.\" But              there's another kind of \"free\" that doesn't get              talked about as much: \"free as in puppy.\" This              concept is based around the idea              thatwhensomeone gives you a free puppy,              that puppy isn't really free. There's a lot of work              and expenses that go into its daily care. The              business term is \"total cost of ownership,\" or              TCO,and it applies to anything, not just open              source software and puppies.            <\/p>\n<p>              So if the free puppy problem applies to everything,              how is it important to open source software              specifically? There are a few ways. First, if you're              already paying for software, then you've set the              expectation that it has costs. Software that's free              up front but costs money later seems like a major              imposition. Secondly, if it happens on an              organization's first open source adoption project, it              can put the organization off of adopting open source              software in the future. Lastly and              counterintuitively, showing that open source software              has a cost may make it an easier \"sell.\" If it's              truly no cost, it seems too good to be true.            <\/p>\n<p>              The following sections represent common areas for              software costs to sneak in. This is by no means a              comprehensive list.            <\/p>\n<p>              To begin using software, you must first have the              software.            <\/p>\n<p>              Getting the software installed is the easy part. Now              you have to use it.            <\/p>\n<p>              Even with a list like this, it takes a lot of              imagination to come up with all of the costs. Getting              the values right requires some experience and a lot              of good guessing, but just going through the process              helps make it more clear. Much like with a puppy, if              you know what you're getting yourself into up front,              it can be a rewarding experience.            <\/p>\n<p><!-- Auto Generated --><\/p>\n<p>View original post here:<br \/>\n<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/opensource.com\/article\/17\/2\/hidden-costs-free-software\" title=\"Free as in puppy: The hidden costs of free software - Opensource.com\">Free as in puppy: The hidden costs of free software - Opensource.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> About the author Ben Cotton - Ben Cotton is a meteorologist by training and a high-performance computing engineer by trade. Ben works as a technical evangelist at Cycle Computing. He is a Fedora user and contributor, co-founded a local open source meetup group, and is a member of the Open Source Initiative and a supporter of Software Freedom Conservancy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31321","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open-source-software"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31321"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31321"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31321\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31321"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euvolution.com\/open-source-convergence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}