I think monetization is difficult IFF you don’t think about asking for money from the get-go. I’m actually of the opinion that open source projects are not well-equipped to build companies around, but can serve as an early guide to nascent market demand.
Monetization looks difficult because people keep building free things and then trying to figure out how to charge for them. From my perspective, the better bet is to build a free thing, prove the market, and then figure out what the paid thing might look like — even if totally different.
I think there’s a decade ahead of us where developers can start asking, “how can I turn this {useful tool} into a SaaS product?” We've been seeing this for years, I just think folks can start getting more ambitious about it. :)
Monetization looks difficult because people keep building free things and then trying to figure out how to charge for them. From my perspective, the better bet is to build a free thing, prove the market, and then figure out what the paid thing might look like — even if totally different.
I think there’s a decade ahead of us where developers can start asking, “how can I turn this {useful tool} into a SaaS product?” We've been seeing this for years, I just think folks can start getting more ambitious about it. :)