AKA: Paid Maintenance, Paid Quality Assurances, ProServ
Payments by companies to check security issues in their OSS supply chain, ensure specific SLAs, or ensure quick fixes for business-threatening problems in the OSS. Sometimes hidden behind a third-party company (middleman) that handles the bureaucracy, quasi-employs the maintainer, and pays him money.
Requires:
- Application to be "hired" by a middleman or setup of contracts with SLAs
- Time to work on problems asap (as defined in SLAs)
- Optionally, setup of private issue tracker, communication platform(s), etc. to interact with companies
Variants & Options:
- Direct contracts: Multiple companies pay maintainer/project directly
- Contracts via Middleman: Companies make contract with Middleman and Middleman with maintainers
- Tidelift (Middleman concept)
- tea.xyz ("guarantee security and reliability to users of open source software projects"; see also their Whitepaper in 5.4. "tea tasters")
| Characteristics | Value | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Effort to set-up | Weeks | Contracts require more time to define (one-time) and negotiate (per company) |
| Effort to maintain | Low | If companies or middleman is still interested only maintenance work is required |
| Cost to set-up | None | |
| Cost to maintain | None | |
| One-time Income | Low | Recurring is more common - one-time payments for emergencies maybe |
| Recurring Income | Medium | Middleman typically caps at salary level. Direct contracts are similar to building a startup/company to meet SLAs |
| Income Predictability | High | Companies or Middleman will pay for a longer time. If Middleman breaks away whole income might vanish. If multiple contracts exist one cancelling company will not endanger full income. |
| Full income Threshold | 1 | 10+ |
| Recipient | I | |
| Additional Work | High | Extra work to fix bugs, develop feature, etc. - might be covered by "standby" time |
| Visibility | None | Companies or middleman seek out and select OSS projects |
| Necessity to pay | Medium | Might be necessary for companies using important projects that are essential to the business-model |
| Entry Threshold | Medium | Companies need contracts with many OSS projects or one Middleman |
| Countervalue | Work | Middleman will probably pay quasi-salary or by the hour; Direct contracts can enable selling the service multiple times |
| Scalability | Medium | Contracts with multiple companies possible. Middleman probably limits at one salary. |
| Effort for marketing | Low | Middleman will do marketing; Direct contracts might need more |
| Competitors | None | Other maintainers might be integrated |
| Software types | All | Esp. essential software that is essential to the business-model of companies |