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@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ Working for [free software](free_software.md) organizations such as the [FSF](fs
Considering all things mentioned above, here are some concrete things of making money on LRS. Keep in mind that a lot of services (PayPal, Patreon etc.) listed here may possibly be [proprietary](proprietary.md) and unethical, so always check them out and consider free alternatives such as [Liberapay](liberapay.md). The methods are following:
- **[donations](donation.md)**: You may ask for donations e.g. on your website or Patreon (people often ask for [cryptocurrencies](crypto.md) or traditional money via services like [Liberapay](liberapay.md), PayPal or Buy Me a Coffee). For significant earnings you need to be somewhat popular because people donate extremely rarely, but if your work is good, there sometimes appears a generous donor who sends you a lot of money ({Happened to me a few times. I hereby thank all those kind people <3 ~drummyfish}). It can help if you create "content" such as programming videos alongside your project to get some "following", but it may also distract you and take some of your energy. People like [Luke Smith](luke_smith.md) seem to make quite some big money like this. A lot of [free culture](free_culture.md) artists are successful in creating free art this way, even completely [public domain](public_domain.md), for example Kenney (the number one creator at [opengameart](oga.md)). If you are really good at what you do and decide to share freely, the freedom lovers WILL spot you and appreciate your effort as it's still the case most free works out there are sadly super amateur.
- **[crowd funding](crowd_funding.md)**: A method similar to donations but a little more "encouraging" for the donors. You set a financial goal and if enough people donate to reach that goal, you get the money and create the project. Patreon and Kickstarter are typically used for this. Open consoles like [Arduboy](arduboy.md) and [Pokitto](pokitto.md) are examples of FOSS projects founded like this. Disadvantage is you have to reach some kind of popularity and respect rules of the funding platforms, so you'll have to sell part of your soul, will have to censor yourself, do "[marketing](marketing.md)" etc., so it may actually suck.
- **[crowd funding](crowd_funding.md)**: A method similar to donations but a little more "encouraging" for the donors. You set a financial goal and if enough people donate to reach that goal, you get the money and create the project. Patreon and Kickstarter are typically used for this. Open consoles like [Arduboy](arduboy.md) and [Pokitto](pokitto.md) are examples of FOSS projects founded like this. Disadvantage is you have to reach some kind of popularity and respect rules of the funding platforms, so you'll have to sell part of your soul, will have to censor yourself, do "[marketing](marketing.md)" etc., so it may actually suck. Once you raise the funds there is also a big pressure to deliver. A slightly better alternative may be so called **"ransom model"** in which you first make the game, show it off, and promise to release it only when you get some money -- here you remove the pressure and possibility of not delivering.
- **[pay what you want](pay_what_you_want.md)**: Here you create the work and then offer a download with optional payment, typically with some suggested price. People who can't afford to pay don't have to. This method has the advantage of not putting you under deadline pressures like the crowd funding method, also you just don't have to care much about sucking someone's... ehm, you know. Sites like [itch.io](https://itch.io/) are friendly to this option, but don't expect this to make you much.
- **selling physical products and [merchandise](merch.md)** ("merch"): This method makes use of the fact that selling physical items is considered less (even though not completely!) unethical, unlike selling copies of [information](information.md). So you can e.g. create a [free](free_software.md) video [game](game.md) and then sell T-shirts or coffee mugs with that video game's themes. You may write a public domain book and then sell physical printed books (of course, others will be able to sell your book too). In the past some [GNU](gnu.md)/[Linux](linux.md) distros used to sell their systems on nice "officials" CDs, but nowadays CDs are kind of dead. [Open consoles](open_console.md) kind of do this as well, they create [FOSS](foss.md) games and tools and then sell hardware that runs these games.
- You can specifically **make use of the advantages of LRS** and get some company to pay you. For example an [open console](open_console.md) creator will be highly interested in an engine for 3D games that will run on very low-spec embedded hardware because that will increase interest in their product. Existing FOSS engines, even the lightweight ones, are [bloated](bloat.md) and won't run on such hardware, however LRS ones, such as [small3dlib](small3dlib.md), will. Even if the company doesn't pay you directly, they might at least send you their product for free ({I got some open consoles for free for porting [Anarch](anarch.md) to them. ~drummyfish}).