Immich Q&A ft. Eron Wolf & Louis Rossmann from Futo
www.youtube.com
A live stream Q&A about Immich joining FUTO and answering the questions from the community.0:00 Introduction9:30 How does FUTO intend to fund Immich? Will th...

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.

  • jvh@feddit.ukEnglish
    3·
    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
      2·
      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.

  • RBG@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    1·
    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
    1·
    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.

  • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.caEnglish
    1·
    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
      1·
      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
        1·
        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
          1·
          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

  • geography082@lemm.eeEnglish
    11·
    6 months ago

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

  • JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nlEnglish
    01·
    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
      0·
      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.