> You might ask, what essential liberty am I excluding by adding the modification clause? Ironically, nothing.
A few sentences later he contradicts that statement by defining what he means by "nothing":
> If I charged $15, someone could ask $8 and undercut me with little effort on their part.
So he denies to others the freedom to distribute the software, which is an essential part of the Open Source term (as well as the Free Software term, which has essentially the same meaning).
Until now, this could have been a plain misunderstanding of the term Open Source. However, a few sentences later the author explains that he deliberately wants to misuse the term Open Source:
> Then I’d have to make the choice to either sell [the app on App store] or open-source the app. I wanted to do both.
So he wants to claim to do Open Source without actually doing Open Source. This is really unfair on all developers who are really doing Open Source.
Note that there is nothing wrong with that business model, but claiming the name "Open Source" for that kind of business is a clear misuse of the term. Open Source has another, well-defined meaning.
The author is perfectly right that with any Open Source license, even as restrictive as GPL or AGPL, you can't make a lot of money by selling copies. This is not an accident, but by design! That's why real Open Source developers sell services around their products, such as support, implementation of customer wishes, etc.
If he doesn't want to do business that way, it's fine! But then he shouldn't claim to do Open Source.
> You might ask, what essential liberty am I excluding by adding the modification clause? Ironically, nothing.
A few sentences later he contradicts that statement by defining what he means by "nothing":
> If I charged $15, someone could ask $8 and undercut me with little effort on their part.
So he denies to others the freedom to distribute the software, which is an essential part of the Open Source term (as well as the Free Software term, which has essentially the same meaning).
Until now, this could have been a plain misunderstanding of the term Open Source. However, a few sentences later the author explains that he deliberately wants to misuse the term Open Source:
> Then I’d have to make the choice to either sell [the app on App store] or open-source the app. I wanted to do both.
So he wants to claim to do Open Source without actually doing Open Source. This is really unfair on all developers who are really doing Open Source.
Note that there is nothing wrong with that business model, but claiming the name "Open Source" for that kind of business is a clear misuse of the term. Open Source has another, well-defined meaning.
The author is perfectly right that with any Open Source license, even as restrictive as GPL or AGPL, you can't make a lot of money by selling copies. This is not an accident, but by design! That's why real Open Source developers sell services around their products, such as support, implementation of customer wishes, etc.
If he doesn't want to do business that way, it's fine! But then he shouldn't claim to do Open Source.