Open Source vs. Closed Source

[Christopher Schmidt]

I write a lot of small programs for my cell phone, in Python. In the
past, I've always released these applications as completely open source,
since I have relatively few expectations that anyone would have trouble
duplicating my effort.

However, as time goes on, I'm realizing more and more that the things
I'm writing are things that people may have a need for, but there exists
no current solution for - that is, I'm providing a product with some
non-zero value to people. In some cases, this is coming at a non-zero
cost to me - development, support, and so on can be quite expensive, as
far as time goes, and these days, my time is relatively stretched even
without additional projects on my back.

With this in mind, and some new tools making it easier for me to package
Python files for the phone in a way that is more than just providing a
.py file, I am going to be experimenting with providing a for-pay
version of applications that I'm writing.

My current development project is one that easily lends itself to this:
I am working on GPSDisplay[1], which is a tool which allows you to
display your location, according to a Bluetooth GPS, on your phone.
There exist relatively few Bluetooth GPS devices with built in displays,
so this is a tool which can provide a way for users of these devices to
get a location fix without pulling out a computer.

I've released a basic, initial version (to which I plan to release the
source, under an MIT license). This version will always remain free.
It handles GPGGA NMEA sentences only: this means it will display your
location, but no velocity data, for example.

I plan to create a much more complete application which fixes this
shortcoming in the next week or two. However, I plan to keep this app
closed source, and not openly licensed. The program will only be
available to those who are willing to pay a nominal, one time fee for
the application. (Think $10 or less.)

The hope is that given a large enough featureset, someone will actually 
want to pay for the application. 

Given that this is a relatively simple program (The original version is
less than 100 lines of code properly spaced), is there a better, more
open way to attempt to make money off the application? To be honest, I'm
not entirely convinced that the path I've chosen will work, but I also
know that providing the source to applications has never gotten me a
dime, so a single person with enough interest in what I've done can not
only make my day, but increase my return on investment.

[1] http://crschmidt.net/symbian/locative/gpsdisplay/

-- 
Christopher Schmidt
Mobile Application Developer
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