I agree they deserve to get paid, but there are better ways than essentially holding customers’ data and URLs hostage. The problem is they are trying to extract money from other open-source developers who are at least as cash-strapped as them.
Plus, I doubt they will get many people to actually start paying. People will simply move to other storage (like Github) and switch the URLs. Docker is fully open-source and works without docker.io, they don’t really have a position here except owning the name.
IMO they just need to edit / clarify that open-source developers and organizations won’t need to pay, only those who presumably should have the funds. And take a more passive stance: bug people with annoying messages like Wikipedia does, and threaten shutting down docker.io altogether if they don’t somehow get funding (some people will complain about this too but more will understand and will be sympathetic). Wikimedia, Unix/Linux, Mozilla, etc. as well as Homebrew/cURL/Rust all seem to be doing fine as nonprofits without creating huge controversies like this.
Plus, I doubt they will get many people to actually start paying. People will simply move to other storage (like Github) and switch the URLs. Docker is fully open-source and works without docker.io, they don’t really have a position here except owning the name.
IMO they just need to edit / clarify that open-source developers and organizations won’t need to pay, only those who presumably should have the funds. And take a more passive stance: bug people with annoying messages like Wikipedia does, and threaten shutting down docker.io altogether if they don’t somehow get funding (some people will complain about this too but more will understand and will be sympathetic). Wikimedia, Unix/Linux, Mozilla, etc. as well as Homebrew/cURL/Rust all seem to be doing fine as nonprofits without creating huge controversies like this.