this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2025
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I sometimes wonder what if everyone who spends money on licensing fees instead takes the same amount of money and puts it into FOSS. Imagine what we could achieve? Likely the money would be used more efficiently because they could donate it to non-profit companies which don't need to pay tax.
Just remember, the license fees mostly don't go into development, or maintenance, or security, or any of that, they mostly pay for "sales" which includes a strong component of end customer support. When you divert "all that money" into FOSS, FOSS development and maintenance might be lucky to get 20%, the other 80% will be spend training and employing tech support.
There are companies which offer training and support to FOSS. Companies could also pay those companies.
Yes, RedHat has been doing this for decades.
Thing is: RedHat probably can't price match M$ in a bidding war, probably not even close.