Professional Freelance Web Developer
CodeIgniter Activist, Caffeine Junkie

Elliot Haughin

The Cost of Free, the Beauty of Open Source

28th February 2010 / Image (cc) souravdas

This post is a collection of thoughts that I’ve had recently regarding my code, and the ‘cost’ of them. As you may know, I’m now blogging more often, and will be re-factoring some of my code to make it cleaner, well documented, and just ‘better’.

I know that when I rebuild my CodeIgniter libraries, I could sell them for say $10 – $20 a pop. But I won’t. That’s a promise. My code will remain free, and always will. I understand that releasing premium ‘paid-for’ code can be a very lucrative business model, since it’s very much a form of passive income rather than active income. But it just doesn’t feel like ‘me’. I like that whatever I release can be used by anyone, regardless of circumstance. And that way, my work gets a wider distribution. My name becomes more well known, and this opens up more opportunities for me.

I believe in free. I believe in open-source. Almost everything I’ve learned has come from the open-source world. CodeIgniter has helped me build a career, pay my mortgage, and buy gadgets. Just because something’s free, doesn’t mean it’s without value. I know that open-source software has real value, both for individuals to learn, and for companies to build great quality, successful commercial applications…

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Review: Cacti 0.8 Network Monitoring – PAKT Publishing

26th February 2010

Before Christmas I was asked by PAKT Publishing to review their book on Cacti 0.8. I'd previously written a blog post all about Monitoring Your Servers and ...

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Building UTF8 Compatible CodeIgniter Applications

23rd February 2010

UTF8 allows your site to represent characters other than those in the basic english alphabet. More often than not, your CodeIgniter Application will contain methods where users can ...

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The Dawn of a New Haughin Era

21st February 2010

Since September things have changed a great deal for me, both in my personal life, and professionally. This had led me to seriously think about what it is that ...

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ExpressionEngine 2 and CodeIgniter – Will we see a change in the 3rd Party Market?

4th November 2009

We've known for a long time that ExpressionEngine is built on top of CodeIgniter. But why is this important, ...

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A Long-Awaited Update

24th September 2009

Hey guys, I've totally neglected my blog over the last few months, and I thought I'd let you all know what I'm up to these days. So, obviously I've ...

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BinaryCake is Launched – Kickass Web Development Screencasts

1st June 2009

For anyone who's downloaded my screencasts in the past, I've got some great news for you! Today Jamie Rumbelow and I have launched BinaryCake, a site dedicated ...

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Boring Stuff

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