Evaluate options for AzuraCast service offering

[gusaus]

AzuraCast is functional and well documented enough for Netmix to provide SaaS and related services even without any special sauce. A list of features for a marketing page and info for support could probably be pulled from the following sources -

https://www.azuracast.com/
https://github.com/AzuraCast/AzuraCast/blob/main/README.md
https://docs.azuracast.com/en/home

In addition, there's potential to partner with Buster and some of the other AzuraCast contributors to provide support. Possibly Netmix could be the 'official' provider as it might be burdensome for AzuraCast and their very small team to run services through their business entity Open Source Collective. This is something we've begun to explore in Open Collective Slack (skim through this thread https://opencollective.slack.com/archives/CE56L3S1W/p1616180869009800) and their GitHub -
AzuraCast/AzuraCast#3994

@tonyzeoli I wouldn't hesitate to followup in any of those discussions since we're already set the stage for collaboration -
https://twitter.com/GetOpenProducer/status/1247972022195372034

[gusaus]

@tonyzeoli Below is the conversation I've been having with Buster in this Open Collective thread - https://opencollective.slack.com/archives/CE56L3S1W/p1616180869009800

Note my reference to https://centova.com/en/cast who from what I can gather is what many stations use but would gladly switch if there was a better option. It would be good to look over their pricing/services for some inspiration https://centova.com/en/cast/packages

Buster also touches on some ideas on how they/we could use Open Collective.

I've also set the table for collaboration/partnership... as of now, Buster has yet to respond.

Transcript

gusaus:house_with_garden: 7 days ago

Just realizing Centova doesn't provide hosting themselves - they do provide related services https://centova.com/cp/order/?group=1763

Think AzuraCast users would value something similar? Pretty sure you could run services using your Open Collective - or work though a partner(s)

Buster Neece 7 days ago

It's something we'd like to do, we just don't have an easy way of selling things like that in a way that ties in easily with a service we already use to identify users (i.e. their GitHub accounts) and spinning up a whole new ecommerce storefront is something we haven't done yet

GitHub Sponsors has started allowing one-time payment tiers that we are considering using for something similar to this

gusaus:house_with_garden: 7 days ago

So would the ideal be to have services directly associated with AzuraCast? like a page/ecommerce on https://www.azuracast.com/
or a stand-alone site/domain

What about providing a hosted offering similar to https://www.airtime.pro/ (obviously I'm too lazy to find an AzuraCast example 😀) either directly or through a partner?

GitHub Sponsors has started allowing one-time payment tiers that we are considering using for something similar to this
Interesting! And that's connected to your Open Collective, right?

Another potential option would be to create tiers on your collective and then embed on your service page or site https://docs.opencollective.com/help/collectives/embed-contribution-flow

Buster Neece 7 days ago

yep, our GH Sponsors funnels into our OpenCollective, and the nice perk is that anyone sponsoring us via GH gets a decoration in all our repos that says "Sponsoring" next to their issue, etc

gusaus:house_with_garden: 7 days ago

Seems like this would be perfect for creating tiers for developer facing services https://github.com/sponsors/AzuraCast
Probably would want to send end users/customers to a service page or stand-alone site. Ideally integrating or embedding Open Collective.

Curious to get your thoughts about this as a way to encourage users (current and potential) to donate - AzuraCast/AzuraCast#3930
From chatting a bit in #fundoss it seems like you'll have a good bit of flexibility with regards to presenting goals and perks

Thinking AzuraCast will be getting a lot of exposure to potential new users in about a month. Could be a great time to roll out or announce related support and/or services.
https://opencollective.slack.com/archives/C01PM2BJFQQ/p1617899124022700?thread_ts=1617898019.022600&cid=C01PM2BJFQQ (edited)

gusaus:house_with_garden: 20 hours ago

I've been talking to Tony Zeoli about providing some mix of AzuraCast services under the Netmix umbrella.

Ideally in collaboration and/or partnership with you and other Azura team members interested in providing services.

We'd also want to figure out efficient/effective ways for funds from services to flow back into the project. Think Open Collective provides some tools for that 😀

Still just kicking around ideas mainly ☝️ but it would great to discuss options and details in the near future if you're interested.

[gusaus]

@tonyzeoli I had a long DM chat with Buster yesterday. He thinks launching an Azuracast equivalent of https://www.airtime.pro/ (the SaaS version of https://www.sourcefabric.org/software/airtime) would have demand and he's interested in collaborating.

Maybe we can chat with Buster after we sort out https://github.com/OpenProducer/internal/issues/5

[gusaus]

Quick update - Buster has now joined #openproducer and I've set up this discussion about common goals and needs.
https://opencollective.slack.com/archives/C22E2D2F2/p1619041582032400

Would be a good one to jump into once we consider https://github.com/OpenProducer/internal/issues/8 and determine goals and needs.

[gusaus]

I transferred this issue from our internal repo so we can openly discuss options with @SlvrEagle23 @paddatrapper and other potential collaborators and partners. As mentioned here #4 (comment) I think together we already have access to infrastructure and tools needed to provide the service. We can fill any people needs once those are identified.

First step is to see if Buster and team are open to exploring options. If yes, we'll then figure out how to fit all pieces together on the business side.

[gusaus]

Closing this issue for a couple of reasons:

1. AzuraCast is now offering professional support services - This is a soft launch (not yet announced?), so I'll defer to @SlvrEagle23 to talk about the services when they're at a point to do so. I think it's probably ok to point out their current focus is on the people side and 'not' on SaaS.
2. OpenProducer (the service) won't itself be providing AzuraCast or any other customer/client-facing services (see- Determine scope of OpenProducer's open source service offering #3) - We would like to help by finding people for AzuraCast (see Define common set of roles and responsibilities based on goals and needs of projects #4 (comment)) or partners interested in providing some aspect of services (like SaaS) that may compliment AzuraCast's offering.

Figuring out the latter is probably out of scope with what we're trying to focus on in this 'community' repo https://github.com/OpenProducer/community

And with that, I'm closing this out!