MovableBlog: Archives: June 2003
June 24th, 2003
MT License Debate »
There is a long (and sometimes heated) discussion about using MT as a hosted service at On The Third Hand. Some of it is misinformed, and as is their wont, Mena and Anil have stepped in to try to clarify some of the issues. This quote from Mena in the above discussion is relevant to my experience (and is also a reiteration and elaboration of what she said in the message boards):
It is *not* true that you can not offer for pay Movable Type support services. The payment of the $150 commercial license (by either the client or the contractor) entitles you to charge for support (installation, customization, design work). When we came up with that number, we figured that most contracts would far exceed the $150 amount and for most contractors, the fee would be nominal. We *never* imagined that a market of providing services for personal users would have flourished. We assumed that businesses (that could easily pay the $150 fee) would be contracting support services. We underestimated the personal user as client demand.
In a later comment she admits that the license needs clarification to include paid installations and other specific services with the payment of a commercial license. Update 11:46 PM: see Mena's comment to this post.
Other reactions here (not in chronological order):
- USS Clueless: Free Ain't Cheap. Six Apart did modify the commercial license almost exactly a year ago, although there's no mention of what that modification was. Also a clarification from a USS Clueless reader.
- Tweezer's Edge: Movable Type Licensing Issues at BlogHouse, which discusses the license in a little more detail, and Final post on Movable Type licensing. Mena's is the first comment to that last post. Update July 7, 1:10 AM: TweezerMan discusses software licenses and what rights software producers can reserve.
- Mutated Monkeys: The Movable Type PR Crisis
- Burningbird: Kicking the Baby Squirrels, Again.Update too damn late for my own good: the comments of that post are worth reading for semi-official comment.
Update June 26, 11:00 AM: Tweezer's edge points out that there is a thread about this that pre-dates the current debate by two months. Anil has a lengthy reply.