** DONE Postcardware                                                             :blog:software:open:
CLOSED: [2018-06-07 Thu 19:30] SCHEDULED: <2018-06-07 Thu>
:PROPERTIES:
:CREATED:  [2018-06-07 Thu 08:38]
:ID:       2018-06-07-cardware
:END:
:LOGBOOK:
- State "DONE"       from "NEXT"       [2018-06-07 Thu 19:30]
:END:

There is a style of software distribution which is called [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardware][postcardware
or in short: cardware]]. It basically offers software for free when you
send an old-fashioned postcard to the programmer.

I do like this idea although I stick to classic open source license
models like the GPL. Therefore, I added a paragraph to the README
files of [[https://github.com/novoid][my open source projects]]:

#+BEGIN_QUOTE
How to Thank Me:

I'm glad you like my tools. If you want to support me:

- Send old-fashioned postcard per snailmail - I love personal feedback!
  - see [[http://tinyurl.com/j6w8hyo][my address]]
- [...]
#+END_QUOTE

This week, I got my first postcard!

#+CAPTION: The postcard from Jack
#+ATTR_HTML: :align center :width 560
[[tsfile:2018-06-07T09.01.44 Thank-you-postcard from Jack 560x420 -- publicvoit anonymized.jpg][2018-06-07T09.01.44 Thank-you-postcard from Jack 560x420 -- publicvoit anonymized.jpg]]

It was sent by [[https://www.baty.net/about/][Jack Baty]] who also wrote [[https://www.baty.net/2018/using-karl-voits-file-naming-system/][a cool article on filetags]] and
related tools by me. He is also using [[https://github.com/novoid/Memacs][Memacs]].

What a nice thing to do - it totally made my day.

To the surprise of many people who ask me about it, I hardly get any
feedback at all on my software projects.
So if you are out there, using nice open source tools, think about
sending a postcard to the programmer or the project - it values the
work invested for making those tools usable to others.