AutoMapper is going commercial

[jbogard]

Hi folks,

I'm letting everyone know here that I've decided to take AutoMapper and MediatR commercial. It was a long decision in the making, but one I feel is necessary to both ensure the future sustainability and growth of these projects and especially the communities. You can read the full announcement on my blog:

AutoMapper and MediatR going commercial

I don't have any more details to share, as I just don't know, but I will be as transparent as possible as I figure things out. Thanks everyone to your support over the years!

[maxisam]

It is inevitable. I think it is not realistic for anyone to maintain OSS for free forever. I do hope the price could be reasonable for a small team with tight budget.

[borisdj]

Can fully understand the struggle with such projects, when just maintaining becomes more then a full time job.
And to add a suggestion for way forward, as I had a similar situation with EFCore.BulkExtensions library.
Therefore could recommend, from personal experience, a hybrid (dual) license type that I have named cFOSS (conditionallyFree OSS) - more info on blog Solution to OpenSource sustainability (SOSs) (options for consideration).

Essentially keeping the code Open and also Free for Most users (via community lic.), but having big companies (over a certain threshold, say 1 mil. gross revenue /y.) pay the License fee on yearly basis - fair usage.
Good practice would be making several (2-4) tiers, e.g. based on number of devs, affordable simple progressive pricing in reasonable range.
This model should be able to have sufficient paying clients to ensure proper and long-term funding, while Openness is retained as much as possible with freedom to use the code under defined circumstances.
Of course fullyFOSS, MIT and alike, remain as is for all projects that do not require extensive support (which is majority), and are not in need of funding.

[mattzink]

Now that v15 is released with a non-MIT license, @jbogard may want to mention that in the release notes. Many devs update their NuGet packages without reading every related GitHub discussion and blog post. Some may not want to upgrade past v14 or not be aware they are breaking the new license requirements.

[jbogard]

Ah thanks! Added it to the release notes. The package does require license acceptance now too.

[naveencbhat]

what is the pricing model? where can I see the details?

[jbogard]

Details here: https://www.jimmybogard.com/automapper-and-mediatr-commercial-editions-launch-today/ and here: https://automapper.io

[CenturySparkle]

automapper.io appears to be down at the moment.

[jbogard]

I was deploying ha, I haven't implemented blue-green deployments yet.

[naveencbhat]

what will happen to existing projects? do we need to pay license to that as well or it is just for upgrades and new projects?

[jbogard]

That's also detailed in the blog post announcement. Nothing happens with the existing versions, they will live on forever. As will code, I've created archive repos. The versions detailed on the announcement have the changed license, which now requires acceptance.

[SymbioticKilla]

@jbogard
Hi,
do you still plan to release v14.x updates if a vulnerability is discovered?
Thank you!

[jbogard]

I have the same plan I had before, which is to say, none. There was no support, guarantees, or warranty. The older versions were always provided as-is.

A couple years ago someone had bugged me for like 18 months on another project of a security vulnerability before I patched it. It was simply not a priority because it did not affect any of my clients. I won't do that going forward on these projects, license holders ARE customers and clients now.

However, I did make archive repos for those versions so anyone is free to fork and patch as they see fit.