PhotoPrism

Details

The project is provided under an AGPLv3 license for the community edition. The plus and pro versions are provided under separate non-FOSS license terms which limit modification & distribution.

The project has supplemented their AGPLv3 license with additional terms. These seem very strict when it comes to trademark use, which raises questions about the ability to fork & provide the required attribution as per standard terms of the AGPLv3 license.

The project does provide a clear overview of the different versions, including what’s provided under the AGPLv3 (Just the community version).

The project generally appears to avoid referring to itself widely as FOSS in marketing and on prominent website & repo pages.

When following the main usage route on their website via “Getting Started”, specifically for the “Community” version, and following the “Docker compose” option, this results in using a version of the application which is not under the AGPL, and instead their plus license. This is mentioned in their various FAQ pages, including their Open Source FAQ, where it explains they do provide AGPL versions under separate tags. Unfortunately those tags are not used by default, or made clear during the path to setup, or mentioned within the downloaded docker-compose file. When started from this compose file, the application would also self-report itself as “PhotoPrism® CE” when viewing settings. This same issue appears apparent when following the “Portainer” and “Pure Docker” getting started options.

The project advertises themselves as “100% self-funded and independent”, and appear to avoid VC-funding of any kind to retain their independence. Their funding appears to come from donations, from selling variations of their software, from providing paid support services, and from partnering with cloud hosting providers.