Gitlab's Open Source program has similar restrictions, and it's just kind of weird. Like, there are multiple companies actually making money off of Xen; but because Xen is owned by a non-profit foundation (with a six-digit yearly budget), and the foundation isn't trying to profit, it still qualifies. (As does, for instance, the GNOME project.)
OTOH, somewhere else in this context it was mentioned that curl is almost entirely maintained by one guy who makes money from consulting; and because of that, he wouldn't qualify.
So if you're either small enough to be a side hobby project, or large enough to have your own non-profit, you can get it for free; anywhere in between and you have to pay.
Personally I'd be happy for Xen to pay for Gitlab Ultimate, except that the price model doesn't really match an open-source project: we can't tell exactly how many people are going to show up and contribute, so how can we pay per-user?
OTOH, somewhere else in this context it was mentioned that curl is almost entirely maintained by one guy who makes money from consulting; and because of that, he wouldn't qualify.
So if you're either small enough to be a side hobby project, or large enough to have your own non-profit, you can get it for free; anywhere in between and you have to pay.
Personally I'd be happy for Xen to pay for Gitlab Ultimate, except that the price model doesn't really match an open-source project: we can't tell exactly how many people are going to show up and contribute, so how can we pay per-user?