Some questions

scottalanmiller

@scottalanmiller So if I understood correctly, some free server app doesn't exist and can't exist, but he complains that NodeBB isn't free?

Actually, I think what he wants is not a free server app (what NodeBB is), but a free complete service. He wants someone to install NodeBB for him for free, hosting it for free on his server that he pays for him, and that way, he feels it's free.

I think what he wants is to promote the same product he promotes in nearly all of his posts. If you look at his history, he has never used NodeBB (he claims) but is constantly talking up another product (which maybe he uses, maybe he doesn't, I don't know) here to try to promote it - but not in an honest way (like saying that it's worked for him or whatever) but by constantly disparaging NodeBB through claims like it isn't free, or claiming that it's a fork of that other product (even though they don't share code or even code stack.) There's nothing that will make him happy, he's just trying to promote a lesser product that he can't come up with a value proposition for, or else he'd just make that.

Lots of people try this "it's not free" tactic to try to get people to not only give them one thing for free, but more and more things for free by trying to intimidate them. And some people are just trying to get free consulting, hosting, or whatever, but it doesn't look like that in this case. He's trying to make other people avoid the product by trying to imply that there is a charge somewhere for using it, when there isn't.

But the logic that he espouses means that no product could ever meet his criteria for free, because any effort, by any person - even just thinking of what the community would be - would constitute effort and therefore not be free. It's the "no such thing as free" argument, but used incorrectly because he says outright that there could be exceptions. The "nothing is free" philosophy is all or nothing. You can't argue it picking and choosing.

scottalanmiller

@cregox said in Some questions :

it's as if @scottalanmiller is really voicing the other 2, that nothing i say makes any sense to you and you all jump into the worst interpretation possible

Just to be clear, because you are twisting this too, I did give you the benefit of the doubt. There are only two real options here. One is that you are being dishonest. The other is that you don't understand what you are saying and actually believe your logic works.

You must understand that to assume the former is, by far, giving you the benefit of the doubt. Acting like I'm being mean to assume you have good mental capacity is pretty twisted. I'm not, and have not, implied that you are confused or can't understand concepts like software, products, or paying money. If I was to assume you weren't lying, I'd have to assume those other things.

So again, a dishonest personal attack to try to make us look bad when, if we are being honest, giving you the benefit of the doubt is exactly what you are trying to defend against.

scottalanmiller

Funny.... thread after thread of this guy talking up Discourse, lying about NodeBB and while it's not proof, his avatar does seem to appear somewhere suspicious...

https://i.imgur.com/EH5Cjwf.png

I take it the Discourse devs are seeing NodeBB as a major threat and their venture capital friends are pushing them to try to make the competition look bad because the product isn't drawing in the users like they'd hoped?

scottalanmiller

Before the avatar gets deleted...

https://i.imgur.com/DVfnEL7.png

Per0x

And here's the killer question. Is Discourse really free? Oh damn, no I have to host it, etc... Lol this guy's a joke.

scottalanmiller

@Per0x said in Some questions :

And here's the killer question. Is Discourse really free? Oh damn, no I have to host it, etc... Lol this guy's a joke.

Well I'll give him that one, he said no forum really is. But Discourse is GPLv2. It's truly free as well. Totally different code, even the license is different, but it's actually free.

Per0x

@scottalanmiller Yes sorry, Forgive me, I tried to think like him for a short moment.

scottalanmiller

@cregox said in Some questions :

if it wasn't clear, yes, i meant free for using online as a free service

Just to be clear, in case anyone is confused by this... NodeBB is a software product, it is not a service. They are conceptually different things.

Like medicine is a product. Nursing is a service. You can get penicillin for free from bread, but if you want a nurse to inject you you might need to pay for the service.

Or like how an engine is a product, but installing an engine that you have already is a service. Nouns and verbs.

julian

Alright, I think we've beaten this horse to death at this point, no?

We could always spin off this discussion into licensing... we're GPLv3, but I do recall we've had discussions in the past about why we're GPLv3 and not v2... or why we're not AGPL... or why we're not MIT...

Well, it is what it is I suppose. The software is free as in libre (our hosted version is identical to our open-source version, save a single plugin we use for telemetry only on hosted versions), but it's also free as in free beer.

Except for the hosting and custom development, that unfortunately cannot be free (for a variety of reasons that I believe have been stated already)

oplik0

I, for one, will agree with @cregox that one could argue that NodeBB isn't free, because you're paying for hosting it.
However, in the same vein, none of the service he mentioned are. On Facebook you're paying with your privacy, by viewing ads AND you're paying for a device capable of running a web browser or a facebook app!
Same thing applies to basically all services like that. You can't escape paying for something down the road, though sometimes the price is your time and attention or your data instead of money
That's why usually to consider something to be free people only consider the price of that thing by itself, and not other things that you might need for your use of the product.

For example - if you got a car without paying for it, would you not consider it free even if you didn't get lifetime supply of gas to go with it? I think most people would consider that car to be free.

Usually the same applies to software. Blender is considered to be free, despite requiring a powerful enough machine to run it which isn't free. You probably got your web browser for free - which is now basically taken for granted despite not having been common in the past - but you still need to pay for your computer, internet connection and electricity. And you most likely don't count these as a price of the browser.

Also, it actually is possible to host NodeBB for free.
Here is a quick example running on glitch: https://nodebb-example.glitch.me/
It's using free tier of MongoDB Atlas to store data, so the DB can grow to up to 512MB without incurring any costs. You can find the details, instructions and remix it here: https://glitch.com/~nodebb-example

Just a warning that this hosting is far from perfect - it has quite a few limitations and while you can work around most (for example apps being put to sleep after around 5 minutes without connections - just use a service like uptime robot to ping it every 5 minutes), it's still probably only a solution for really small forums.

You can find a few other services that might run NodeBB for free on free-for.dev but I just wanted to test glitch so that's what I used.
There are some guides for heroku, though I'm not sure if they work with the free tier ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Hmm... I might check some other and create some guide on hosting NodeBB for free for small forums...

EDIT: also, just a note about this glitch instance - it has a few lines modified, though I'll have to look into it again since I was making the changes in the middle of the night, so I'm not entirely sure if the changes were necessary. But basically, nconf wasn't correctly configured to use environmental variables in at least one file that can be used to start NodeBB.
I think I'll check it later and make a PR to fix this

EDIT2:
Oh, I wrote most of it before the last comment here, so I'll also have to disagree with @julian - hosting can be free (as shown here) and custom development can be free too if you do it yourself
head touch
(I mean, except the time spent on it...)

And I'm actually net positive when it comes to spending money on hosting NodeBB, since the one bug bounty I got is still higher than what I spent on hosting NodeBB in total

Per0x

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

hosting can be free (as shown here) and custom development can be free too if you do it yourself

Your time and you brain work are free? How do you get your food?

oplik0

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

(I mean, except the time spent on it...)

Per0x

So, free or not free at all?
More seriously, we really need to distinguish between a service and an app...
NodeBB is NOT a service. If you want one, it's called NodeBB Instant Hosting https://nodebb.org/pricing
But if you want a free app (what we're talking about), it's there: https://github.com/NodeBB/NodeBB/releases

We've already talked about buying hardware, electricity, etc., but that's irrelevant, it's another subject for which the NodeBB app can't do anything, because even with all the will in the world, no developer on this planet can make time, food, or electricity free, and it is not attributable to the application itself.

scottalanmiller

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

I, for one, will agree with @cregox that one could argue that NodeBB isn't free, because you're paying for hosting it.
However, in the same vein, none of the service he mentioned are.

Well HE mentioned that none of them were free. But hosting something possibly costing you money is unrelated to the thing itself being free.

There are three key problems.... the one is that we are associating the cost of an action with the cost of an item, that can't work. That requires all kinds of illogical connections. For example, can jewelry not be free (or even exist) because it doesn't "do" anything? It just sits there. So since it does nothing, it can't be free? Clearly it can. NodeBB (and millions of other products) are free regardless of whether you want to run them, try to run them, etc. They simple "are free", even if you don't know about them, many of them are already free to you today. They are free regardless of anything you may or may not wish to use them in conjunction with.

The second is that there is an assumption that hosting is an intrinsic component of NodeBB. It's certainly the most common use example, but it is not the only function. NodeBB can be run locally on existing resources, for free. It can be read without being run, studied, copied, forked, or stored. Or just have ownership of. All those things are free use cases. Not that that matters, clearly, but it's important to note that hosting isn't a foregone conclusion.

The third is the notion that hosting can't be free. It is, in fact, often free. Rarely good hosting, but lots and lots of hosting is free. I actually run a provider that does free hosting, including of NodeBB (not for you people, it's for special cases, don't come asking for free hosting, lol). So it's almost important to note that just because the NodeBB team themselves don't make the hosting free, doesn't mean that it isn't. The same is try of the customization, find an intern willing to work for free, and that's free too.

scottalanmiller

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

And you most likely don't count these as a price of the browser.

Because they aren't part of the cost. You can have a free browser without having a way to run it well, or to run it at all.

If my friend gives me a CD (remember those?) and I don't own a CD player, that doesn't change the fact that the CD was a gift, and was free. You can have a free item, without having an assumed use case for it. The CD is free, that's an absolute. How can I listen to it? There are loads of free options, or non-free options. Plus options that include not listening to it at all.

Imagine being given a dollar. And claiming it's not a gift because you are required to spend it. It just doesn't make sense.

scottalanmiller

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

Also, it actually is possible to host NodeBB for free.
Here is a quick example running on glitch: https://nodebb-example.glitch.me/
It's using free tier of MongoDB Atlas to store data, so the DB can grow to up to 512MB without incurring any costs. You can find the details, instructions and remix it here: https://glitch.com/~nodebb-example

And that's if you just want a boxed service. There are loads of companies that will host things if there is a good purpose for it.

We host veterinary information, for example. And we do business services, for third world locations. We don't charge, we don't even advertise. It's just... free. We can't do it unlimited, but we do it. And loads of others do, too.

oplik0

@scottalanmiller said in Some questions :

@oplik0 said in Some questions :
I, for one, will agree with @cregox that one could argue that NodeBB isn't free, because you're paying for hosting it.
However, in the same vein, none of the service he mentioned are.
Well HE mentioned that none of them were free. But hosting something possibly costing you money is unrelated to the thing itself being free.

There are three key problems.... the one is that we are associating the cost of an action with the cost of an item, that can't work. That requires all kinds of illogical connections. For example, can jewelry not be free (or even exist) because it doesn't "do" anything? It just sits there. So since it does nothing, it can't be free? Clearly it can. NodeBB (and millions of other products) are free regardless of whether you want to run them, try to run them, etc. They simple "are free", even if you don't know about them, many of them are already free to you today. They are free regardless of anything you may or may not wish to use them in conjunction with.

The second is that there is an assumption that hosting is an intrinsic component of NodeBB. It's certainly the most common use example, but it is not the only function. NodeBB can be run locally on existing resources, for free. It can be read without being run, studied, copied, forked, or stored. Or just have ownership of. All those things are free use cases. Not that that matters, clearly, but it's important to note that hosting isn't a foregone conclusion.

The third is the notion that hosting can't be free. It is, in fact, often free. Rarely good hosting, but lots and lots of hosting is free. I actually run a provider that does free hosting, including of NodeBB (not for you people, it's for special cases, don't come asking for free hosting, lol). So it's almost important to note that just because the NodeBB team themselves don't make the hosting free, doesn't mean that it isn't. The same is try of the customization, find an intern willing to work for free, and that's free too.

Did you read my full post? Because that was kinda my point. You can argue that there are costs around NodeBB therefore NodeBB isn't free, but it's all really arbitrary because you can argue the same way about many different things that seem obvious. The question is where do you draw the line?
Because at some point everything will be paid and the word "free" becomes literally meaningless since there are no fully free things.

And usually, when talking about a specific product, where the costs are similar between different products within the same category, people draw the line on the cost of the product itself. Hell, often even if costs to run things are different, people consider only the cost of this specific product, not the cost to run it (for example, computers - I don't usually see people mentioning the power consumption as part of the price...).
NodeBB usually isn't free to run, but no forum software is, and some have upfront cost. So when asking "is NodeBB free" a reasonable assumption is that we don't count the costs to run it, since that's kinda the standard.

Especially since there is free hosting. I mentioned one example and linked to a list with some other possible options. And that's just stuff that's available for free to anyone, because sometimes there will be circumstances where you can get a better hosting for free - for example sometimes larger open source projects can get something like this free/at a discount (for example it's free at NodeBB Instant Hosting), something like GitHub Education for students, some friends or something.

And additionally, the actual price of paid hosting is not constant and not something that the creators of the product are responsible for. It all depends on hosting providers and your needs...

Per0x

@scottalanmiller I figured all those supposedly free presents I got at Christmas were fake. If they were really gifts, they had to offer me the Hifi system, the house to store the equipment, the electricity bill for life, and a clone/duplicate of myself to listen to the music so it wouldn't cost me my free time.

@oplik0 You're not talking about an app, you're talking about a service. It's not for lack of saying it again, and again...

scottalanmiller

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

That's why usually to consider something to be free people only consider the price of that thing by itself, and not other things that you might need for your use of the product.

The idea here isn't bad. But the terminology is all wrong. People usually only consider the cost of the thing by itself, because that's the only part that applies. A hammer is free when given as a gift. The cost of using the hammer, of the lifetime of the hammer, couldn't be assumed or calculated by any means. If it is hung on the wall as a souvenir or a momento, it might cost $.10 for its lifetime of very valuable use. Or to swing it for 50 years might cost... well how do you calculate that cost even if you knew how it would be used indefinitely in the future? It's ephemeral at best. But doesn't change the fact that the hammer and the use of the hammer are two different things.

What you are talking about is TCO, or Total Cost of Ownership. That's a wholly different concept. That is what we use in business to determine the total cost of "achieving results" that comes from the entire process of procuring and using a system, which may include multiple items, uses, etc. That driving nails for 10 years has a cost is different from "obtaining a hammer" has cost. The cost of the hammer, if used to drive the nails, becomes part of that equation, but if the nails cost money, and the hammer doesn't, the hammer is free and the nails have a cost. And the two together, plus the cost of labor, management, insurance, etc. is the TCO.

But you can't use a TCO that is greater than zero to claim that an item whose cost is zero is greater than zero.

scottalanmiller

@oplik0 said in Some questions :

The question is where do you draw the line?

Exactly, which I had pointed out. There is only one place that one can draw the line - where the language says that it is drawn. NodeBB is a product, an item, and not a service. Saying that NodeBB is free has zero implication that hosting is free, or isn't free, or is required, or is an option. NodeBB itself is free, no grey area, the line is an absolute. So there should be no question of where to draw a line, the line is determined by the language.

If you start down the hosting path and include "anything someone might do with the free item" then there is nowhere to clearly draw a line. Likewise, to do this, the concept of free can't exist at all.