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Datastar's creators address community concerns about their v1 release and Pro offering. The core library remains MIT-licensed and free, while Pro bundles convenience plugins, developer tools, and CSS framework as optional paid additions. The team clarifies that all Pro functionality can be replicated using the free version and standard APIs, emphasizing they've set a support boundary rather than paywalling essential features. Pro is positioned as a one-time lifetime purchase supporting the nonprofit-stewarded project.

Greedy Developer?

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I have been following Datastar for a while now and this “Greedy developer” thing is blow completely out of proportions.
The pro features is simply a convenient way to support the project.
I have spent 200 hours + making a real website used by real people in Datastar and I never felt I needed Datastar Pro.

I’m a 99% commercial/closed-source develoeper and it’s really starting to get on my nerves. Can’t open-source developers make profit out of their work, especially when said work doesn’t affect the open-source part? DataStar devs even went and showed how to get by without the paid version. I, for one, support their move.
This is turning into exploitation of volunteered effort very fast, with corporations leading the charge (looking at you, Google). And when someone tries to profit off of their work, they get slammed for it?
If we continue along this path, OSS will simply cease to exist in the long run and we’ll return to the 90s with all the software and libraries being paid again or at least closed-source and dual-licensed.

I don’t object to PRO versions in theory but I assume this means all PRs that overlap with existing or planned PRO features will now be rejected.
It kind of kills the project as OSS even if the license doesn’t change. It also feels a bit predatory since all previous contributors are now left with little choice but to hard fork or pay up for PRO features even if they previously submitted code that made those PRO features possible.
It just doesn’t feel like it’s in the spirit of OSS to drop a PRO bundle if you didn’t state your intention from day one. Make it open source but closed contribution if your intention is to make money off the project someday.
EDIT: I have no idea what’s in datastars pro bundle but there is a going trend for projects to start doing this only once they become popular.