Question Thinking about an open source project, how does this work?

[Neal]

Hello all,

I have a project idea and I am considering making it an open source project to enjoy and share programming with fellow devs with a common interest which this app serves. I understand I'd use something like GitHub but how can you make money on an open source project that would have both a cloud (web) UI as well as iOS and Android apps?

How can I maintain control of this so someone else can't run off with the code and have an app of their own?

Is it legal to sell an open source app?

Any thoughts on how to go about this, protect my intellectual property, make some money off of it, etc.?

 

[Skydiver]

How can I maintain control of this so someone else can't run off with the code and have an app of their own?

Via the license... As I recall, for a while MS dabbled with "open source" where the source for some libraries could be read for learning purposes, but could not be lifted and incorporated elsewhere. And later, that expanded out to the MS "shared source" license.

Also look up how SimCity became open source as Metropolis.

Most of that is in the past though. I think a lot of current apps follow something similar to VirtualBox: base product is free and open, but extra goodies built on top of VirtualBox come exclusively from the company at a price.