> why don't OSS maintainers just charge for their work?
What if we turn this from a rhetorical question to an actual question?
My totally unverified take:
1. Missing transaction / Payment infrastructure. The same reason why paid music streaming services were successful depite piracy being a thing.
2. Bureaucracy associated with earning money. In many countries, going from "unpaid" to "€1 per month" is a nightmare.
... and a suggestion to make both less dire: A transaction infrastructure that allows small projects (that wouldn't be a cash cow anyway) to forward all payments to another project of the project Author's choice.
I don't disagree with any of what you wrote here, but I don't think the solution is "well we haven't figured this out, OSS who talk all the time about free as in beer free software now all of a sudden want to get paid for their work" is to just go around uncharging other people/organizations to support their projects, especially if not all OSS projects are worth supporting.
What if we turn this from a rhetorical question to an actual question?
My totally unverified take:
1. Missing transaction / Payment infrastructure. The same reason why paid music streaming services were successful depite piracy being a thing.
2. Bureaucracy associated with earning money. In many countries, going from "unpaid" to "€1 per month" is a nightmare.
... and a suggestion to make both less dire: A transaction infrastructure that allows small projects (that wouldn't be a cash cow anyway) to forward all payments to another project of the project Author's choice.
Edit: See https://old.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/d2ic2e/krita_is_now_...