Hi, I’m a solo developer working on my first project. The plugin is a creative vocal corrector, featuring microtonal and non-Western scales, the ability to create custom scales, and various temporal modulations. The plugin isn’t just a vocal corrector; it also adds colour to the sound. As for the business model – partly for ethical reasons – I was thinking of a Vital-style model: a fully functional free plugin, but with additional presets, secondary features (graphics, more custom scales, etc.), and paid access to the roadmap and community (for example) at a price of between 30 and 50 euros. I’d like to keep the code closed source. I’m based in Italy and will be distributing it from here. Do I need a paid licence?
You can find the JUCE EULA here, The JUCE 8 End User Licence Agreement - JUCE, which should answer all your licensing questions.
JUCE is dual licensed under the open source AGPLv3 licence and the JUCE licence. If you don’t want to use the AGPLv3, because you want to keep your project closed source, then you must use a JUCE licence.
The JUCE EULA doesn’t distinguish between either the type of project, or how you are selling and distributing it (unless you are creating a plug-in generator, that allows other people to use JUCE indirectly). It is only the revenue and funding limit that determines the appropriate tier:
Please note that almost all questions we answer about licensing defer to the actual text in the EULA. The EULA is the legal agreement you have to use JUCE, and additional commentary about the EULA from the JUCE developers on the forum is not classed as official legal advice - we are not lawyers.
Thank you for your comprehensive reply! I’m sorry if I’ve gone into too much detail; I just wanted to make sure I was acting within the law, as this is my first serious project.
We’re happy to help!