Jekyll2021-02-24T21:18:33+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/feed.xmlScotland OSUM!Promote FOSS to users and communities in ScotlandEp06 - Supporting FOSS Maintainers, handling conflict, Homebrew & Software Freedom Conservancy with Mike McQuaid2021-02-24T00:00:00+00:002021-02-24T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/podcasts/2021/02/24/sosum-podcast-s01-ep06<p>On this episode we welcome Mike McQuaid, a long standing maintainer (10+ years) and project lead of Homebrew. We talk about Mike’s journey of becoming a maintainer and how he manages to sustain a healthy relationship with his project and it’s community by establishing a good work life balance and having a clear definition of a maintainer’s responsibilities. As a strong advocate for supporting maintainers Mike describes how he and Homebrew’s team of maintainers deal with the negativity of both the job and certain members of the community by the use of tools, bots and a supportive approach to day to day working with one another. We also talk about Homebrew’s progression to becoming a member project of the Software Freedom Conservancy and the benefits it brings to both the project and those involved.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p><a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/episode/43559287" data-resource="episode_id=43559287" data-width="100%" data-height="200px" data-theme="light" data-playlist="false" data-playlist-continuous="false" data-autoplay="false" data-live-autoplay="false" data-chapters-image="true" data-episode-image-position="right" data-hide-logo="false" data-hide-likes="false" data-hide-comments="false" data-hide-sharing="false" data-hide-download="true">Listen to “Ep06 - Supporting FOSS Maintainers, Homebrew & Software Freedom Conservancy with Mike McQuaid” on Spreaker.</a></p>
<h2 id="shownotes">Shownotes</h2>
<ul>
<li>00:11 - Introduction</li>
<li>01:21 - How did you start your journey into open source?</li>
<li>02:26 - Using Linux at University</li>
<li>03:40 - End of University releasing small projects using self-hosted git repository</li>
<li>04:02 - Internship at Wolfson Microelectronics</li>
<li>04:40 - Joined Google Summer of Code with KDE project</li>
<li>05:33 - Converted onto Mac as main development environment</li>
<li>05:54 - Start of the Homebrew project by Max Howell</li>
<li>06:18 - Joined the Homebrew project as maintainer</li>
<li>07:00 - What kept you motivated to continue being a maintainer? 10+ years is a long time.</li>
<li>08:15 - Aim for the project (Homebrew) to outlive me</li>
<li>08:43 - The people of open source (the ups & down)</li>
<li>10:15 - It’s hard not to take some of the negativity personally</li>
<li>10:45 - Feedback on design decisions that have evolved over time</li>
<li>11:05 - Working with the benefit of the doubt on these design decisions as many consumers are “silent” until something is wrong</li>
<li>12:05 - Pride of a maintainer and their code - A benefit and a negative?</li>
<li>13:15 - Open to praise, but potentially also negativity</li>
<li>14:30 - Day-to-Day doing things for those that work along side you</li>
<li>15:35 - Striking a balance of needs and having friendly obligations between maintainers</li>
<li>15:50 - To grow a community of maintainers</li>
<li>17:10 - Do you feel maintainers are obligated to provide to the users due to the perception of how the industry works?</li>
<li>18:14 - But the problem is when people feel they “need” to fix</li>
<li>19:05 - Open Source licenses explicitly state that liability is waived</li>
<li>20:25 - With the increased consumption of open source means more consumers raise issues versus raising fixes</li>
<li>21:50 - Maintainers don’t have a legal or moral obligation to fix all the issues raised</li>
<li>22:30 - Low tolerance of rudeness or non issues helps maintainers</li>
<li>23:30 - Own experiences of users that have “contributed” by forms of feedback</li>
<li>24:40 - Do you feel that with this increased consumption of open source had led maintainers to burnout?</li>
<li>25:10 - More difficult for single maintainers versus multiple persons projects</li>
<li>26:40 - Burnout may also be attributed to the culture you are within</li>
<li>27:28 - So much energy in your tank - I like playing computer games to relieve stress</li>
<li>28:32 - Trying to be productive during your downtime may work for some if there is enjoyment</li>
<li>30:10 - Working long hours (especially in open source) with little in return can attribute to burnout</li>
<li>30:41 - The longer you’re in open source your motivation needs to be intrinsic</li>
<li>31:59 - How do you encourage users to the appropriate etiquette when dealing with Maintainers & vice versa</li>
<li>32:10 - Issues Templates to be direct</li>
<li>33:11 - Being self-aware of your good & bad traits when on boarding new maintainers</li>
<li>33:53 - Being direct often helps resolve issues quicker</li>
<li>35:53 - Haven’t experienced Rude members converting to good contributors</li>
<li>37:07 - Some Maintainers may find conflict difficult. Do you think we as maintainers, have support?</li>
<li>37:57 - Worked on the Open Source Guides</li>
<li>38:20 - Join conferences and meetups to meet together from all different experiences</li>
<li>39:28 - Find friends within the Robots - automate your maintainer’s workflow/interactions</li>
<li>40:09 - People respond to “Robots” differently</li>
<li>41:21 - Use bots to avoid unnecessary confrontation</li>
<li>43:55 - Thinking about the longevity of Open Source projects - Homebrew becoming a non-profit supported by Software Freedom Conservancy</li>
<li>44:30 - Commit to not personally finance the project - purchases made as a community</li>
<li>45:40 - Started a kickstarter to fund at the beginning</li>
<li>46:37 - Thinking more on our financial independence looking for a fiscal host</li>
<li>48:50 - Now have a Project Leader Committee allowing me to step back</li>
<li>50:01 - Having electoral board members including technical lead, project lead etc.</li>
<li>51:33 - Allows more diverse personalities and reduces the chance of being stagnant</li>
<li>51:47 - Covered alot of topics and that we should aim to support our Open Source Maintainers as equally as those that contribute</li>
<li>54:25 - As a long time contributor to FOSS what advice would you give to contributors to educate themselves on?</li>
<li>54:50 - “As you get older you should do fewer things better”</li>
<li>56:24 - Starting in Open Source to “scratch your own itch”</li>
<li>57:38 - Don’t give up too much of yourself. Get involved in projects in a healthy way</li>
<li>58:40 - How can people reach you?</li>
<li>59:25 - Thank you</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="resources">Resources</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="mikemcquaid.com">Website: mikemcquaid.com</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/MikeMcQuaid">Twitter: @MikeMcQuaid</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/MikeMcQuaid">GitHub: https://github.com/MikeMcQuaid</a></li>
<li><a href="https://brew.sh/">Homebrew</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/Homebrew">Homebrew GitHub:</a></li>
<li><a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software Freedom Conservancy</a></li>
<li><a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/07rdnm3rGWXvaJF7385fxq">Balancing Dads podcast (Spotify)</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="transcript">Transcript</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="">Transcript (Coming Soon)</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="contribute">Contribute</h2>
<p>If you see anything to adjust, spelling or context, please feel free to contribute on the <a href="https://gitlab.com/scot-osum/scot-osum.gitlab.io/">Scotland Open Source Users Meetups’s Repo</a></p>Scotland Open Source Users MeetupsOn this episode we welcome Mike McQuaid, a long standing maintainer (10+ years) and project lead of Homebrew. We talk about Mike’s journey of becoming a maintainer and how he manages to sustain a healthy relationship with his project and it’s community by establishing a good work life balance and having a clear definition of a maintainer’s responsibilities. As a strong advocate for supporting maintainers Mike describes how he and Homebrew’s team of maintainers deal with the negativity of both the job and certain members of the community by the use of tools, bots and a supportive approach to day to day working with one another. We also talk about Homebrew’s progression to becoming a member project of the Software Freedom Conservancy and the benefits it brings to both the project and those involved.Ep05 - Open Source in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Glasgow with Dr Bernd Porr2020-12-07T00:00:00+00:002020-12-07T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/podcasts/2020/12/07/sosum-podcast-s01-ep05<p>We’re joined by Dr Bernd Porr from the Engineering school of Glasgow University to discuss how and why he has introduced open source to his Biomedical Engineering students. We talk about the importance of teaching open source, especially those not in computer science studies, as well as what would encourage universities to implement more open source education. We also delve into how open source has benefited the neuroscience community with The Human Brain Project and Dr Porr’s own contributions of the mapping of the limbic systems – plus I learn a few things about the reward system in Rats. Lastly talk about the University’s support of open source by other departments, what advice he would give to contributors and Dr Porr’s (many amazing) personal projects.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p><a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/episode/42363603" data-resource="episode_id=42363603" data-width="100%" data-height="200px" data-theme="light" data-playlist="false" data-playlist-continuous="false" data-autoplay="false" data-live-autoplay="false" data-chapters-image="true" data-episode-image-position="right" data-hide-logo="false" data-hide-likes="false" data-hide-comments="false" data-hide-sharing="false" data-hide-download="true">Listen to “Ep05 - Open Source in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Glasgow with Dr Bernd Porr” on Spreaker.</a></p>
<h2 id="shownotes">Shownotes</h2>
<ul>
<li>0:00 - Starting off things differently</li>
<li>0:52 - Introduction</li>
<li>1:56 - How did you start your journey into open source?</li>
<li>3:43 - Reminising CDs in magazines?</li>
<li>4:36 - Open Source as part of the Real Time Embedded Programming module @ Glasgow University Engineering</li>
<li>7:40 - Encourging (forced) students to code on supplied Raspberry Pis and publish it</li>
<li>8:58 - Did the students hear about open source before the course considering they may have came from different disciplines other than computer sciene.</li>
<li>11:06 - Teaching students the culture of open source is important</li>
<li>11:28 - Do you get a chance to teach the students the culture, licensing and aspects of participation?</li>
<li>12:59 - What projects were you fond of that the students made open source?</li>
<li>13:24 - GhostChess (student project)</li>
<li>14:14 - Hand gesture recognition (student project)</li>
<li>15:32 - Do any of the student go back to their projects in the future?</li>
<li>16:36 - How can we encourage students to continue in open source?</li>
<li>17:05 - Need more government policy and companies that include and promote open source</li>
<li>18:04 - Any difficulties getting this open source module into the course? Is the I.T. department supportive of this introduction?</li>
<li>18:50 - Academia love for MatLab</li>
<li>20:11 - Do you think open source would benefit from other backgrounds of studies?</li>
<li>21:34 - Being open source helps find bugs and provides a level of creditiabily to the research outcomes veruses closed source software</li>
<li>22:18 - The Human Brain Project and open source</li>
<li>24:00 - Neurobotics platform to link up brains to accurately simulate environments</li>
<li>25:02 - A previous student presenting using this at the Fens (Federation of European Neuroscience Societies) Forum 2020 (held in Glasgow)</li>
<li>25:13 - Is there a percentage of how much of the brain has been mapped and how much to go?</li>
<li>27:11 - One of your contributions is the mapping of the limbic system. What is this system?</li>
<li>27:37 - Our limbic system is almost identical to a rat’s</li>
<li>28:31 - Is there more to be mapped or do you intend to map others?</li>
<li>28:40 - The limbic system is extremely complex and current research is on how depression is involved with the firing of different hormones</li>
<li>30:22 - The project contains open sourced brain models as well as the tools to use them like the brain simulator</li>
<li>31:06 - Lowering the barrier to access these tools</li>
<li>32:18 - Why do you feel we should put FOSS in a promiment position infront of students aswell as universities?</li>
<li>34:31 - We need a course dedicated to open source to highlight its importance within the industry</li>
<li>34:05 - Always a slight disconnect between education and the industry but trying to bridge this gap by inviting those to the classes</li>
<li>35:44 - What do you feel would have the most impact of advoacing open source within education - the inclusion of the tech itself or the participation in the coursework?</li>
<li>38:00 - How closely do you work with the University’s I.T. department with introducing open source?</li>
<li>38:49 - They introduced a second seperate network to support the Raspberry Pis</li>
<li>40:42 - As a long time contributor to FOSS what advice would you give to contributors to educate themselves on?</li>
<li>42:36 - Do you have any other projects you are working on?</li>
<li>43:20 - Filming - Vagabondo “How do EU citizens living in the UK feel after the Brexit vote?”</li>
<li>44:43 - How can people reach you?</li>
<li>45:34 - Any other events you are attending? FENS Glasgow 2020 & New York Film Festival</li>
<li>46:39 - Active in Glasgow Loves EU group</li>
<li>47:02 - Thank you</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="resources">Resources</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.berndporr.me.uk/">Website: https://www.berndporr.me.uk/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/berndporr">Twitter: @berndporr</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/berndporr">GitHub: https://github.com/berndporr</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.humanbrainproject.eu/en/">The Human Brain Project</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/HumanBrainProject/">The Human Brain Project (GitHub)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/engineering/staff/berndporr/">Dr Bernd Porr Staff Profile</a></li>
<li><a href="https://hackaday.com/2018/04/19/play-chess-against-a-ghost/">GhostChess: Hackaday</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/glasgowneuro">Glasgow Neuro GitHub</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.glasgowneuro.tech/">Glasgow Neuro</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.tinnitustailor.tech/">Tinnitus Tailor</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.attys.tech/">Attys: open source high precision bluetooth data acquisition device</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.eigenproductions.co.uk/">Eigen Productions</a></li>
<li><a href="https://forum2020.fens.org/destination-glasgow/">Fens 2020 Glasgow</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="transcript">Transcript</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="">Transcript (Coming Soon)</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="contribute">Contribute</h2>
<p>If you see anything to adjust, spelling or context, please feel free to contribute on the <a href="https://gitlab.com/scot-osum/scot-osum.gitlab.io/">Scotland Open Source Users Meetups’s Repo</a></p>Scotland Open Source Users MeetupsWe’re joined by Dr Bernd Porr from the Engineering school of Glasgow University to discuss how and why he has introduced open source to his Biomedical Engineering students. We talk about the importance of teaching open source, especially those not in computer science studies, as well as what would encourage universities to implement more open source education. We also delve into how open source has benefited the neuroscience community with The Human Brain Project and Dr Porr’s own contributions of the mapping of the limbic systems – plus I learn a few things about the reward system in Rats. Lastly talk about the University’s support of open source by other departments, what advice he would give to contributors and Dr Porr’s (many amazing) personal projects.Ep04 - KDE & the future of apps, Open Development applied to non tech communities & OpenUK with Jonathan Riddell2020-08-11T00:00:00+00:002020-08-11T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/podcasts/2020/08/11/sosum-podcast-s01-ep04<p>Being in open source has many wonderful opportunities, including traveling the world and meeting some inspirational people. One of its biggest appeals is that we can see it changing the world and can impact those that use it for the better…</p>
<p>..</p>
<p>In this episode we talk to a well know figure in Scottish open source and influencer Jonathan Riddell, the creator of Kubuntu and KDE Neon (among other amazing open source contributions). We talk about his vision for KDE Neon and the KDE community by bringing open source apps to a wider audience through proprietary app platforms. We also discuss how we can apply the principles of open development to offline communities as well as the Scottish government and why we think its needed. Lastly we highlight the events that OpenUK, which Jonathan is the chair of the awards committee, are planning and their aspirations to promote open tech in the UK.</p>
<p><a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/episode/40194061" data-resource="episode_id=40194061" data-width="100%" data-height="200px" data-theme="light" data-playlist="false" data-playlist-continuous="false" data-autoplay="false" data-live-autoplay="false" data-chapters-image="true" data-episode-image-position="right" data-hide-logo="false" data-hide-likes="false" data-hide-comments="false" data-hide-sharing="false" data-hide-download="true">Listen to “Ep04 - KDE & the future of apps, Open Development applied to non tech communities & OpenUK with Jonathan Riddell” on Spreaker.</a></p>
<h2 id="shownotes">Shownotes</h2>
<ul>
<li>1:23 - How did you start your journey into open source and what about it appealed to you?</li>
<li>2:55 - Did you always have that mindset that open source can improve the world?</li>
<li>3:43 - IBM talk that claimed that Linux desktop will take over the world which led into the KDE project</li>
<li>5:08 - Q: How did you get involved with Ubuntu? A: Through the Quaker’s free software network.</li>
<li>6:21 - “Super secret start up”</li>
<li>7:38 - How did Kubuntu start off and now KDE Neon and what makes it different to other traditional distros (in the face that it isn’t a distro at all)</li>
<li>10:06 - KDE slightly pigeon holed</li>
<li>10:47 - Ubuntu releases every 6 months</li>
<li>11:40 - Found current Linux distros limiting and waiting to change that with KDE Neon</li>
<li>14:04 - What is your vision with the KDE community and making KDE Neon more accessible to a wider audience</li>
<li>15:40 - Using latest package management like snap packages etc</li>
<li>16:00 - Building apps that can be shared across multiple distros</li>
<li>16:43 - Is this in progress just now? Yes, but it’s a culture shift.</li>
<li>17:20 - Who maintains these apps?</li>
<li>19:09 - You said that creating new apps is a culture shirt, what are the problems you are seeing to encourage this?</li>
<li>22:50 - What other sort of benefits to our open source project do you think having its apps on proprietary app stores?</li>
<li>23:30 - KDE Academy 2020 (online 4th-11th September)</li>
<li>25:09 - What common traits from your open development have you applied to non-technical communities you are a part of?</li>
<li>27:05 - Where’s the Water project</li>
<li>28:30 - Did this community have to learn how to contribute using new tools, how was their experience?</li>
<li>29:45 - How do you think the aspects of open development could be applied to our Scottish institudes, governments or other industries?</li>
<li>31:05 - Visited Munich and Barcelona governments that have embraced open source</li>
<li>33:13 - That hasn’t happened in Scotland yet…</li>
<li>34:18 - We need a culture shift to focus on in-house technical knowledge instead of outsourcing.</li>
<li>35:06 - Do you think that Scotland is missing the FOSS consultancies?</li>
<li>35:50 - OpenUK - Any upcoming events?</li>
<li>38:50 - As a long time contributor to FOSS what advice would you give to contributors to educate themselves on?</li>
<li>40:01 - Umbrello still being used today…</li>
<li>40:33 - How can people reach you?</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="resources">Resources</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://jriddell.org">Website: Jonathan Riddell</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/jriddell">Twitter: @jriddell</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.blue-systems.com/">Blue Systems: https://www.blue-systems.com/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://krita.org/en/">Krita: https://krita.org/en/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://f-droid.org/">F-Droid: https://f-droid.org/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://akademy.kde.org/">KDE Academy: https://akademy.kde.org/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.canoescotland.org/go-paddling/wheres-the-water#gsc.tab=0">Where’s the Water: https://www.canoescotland.org/go-paddling/wheres-the-water</a></li>
<li><a href="https://openuk.uk/">OpenUK: https://openuk.uk/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://mimugloves.com/">MimuGloves: https://mimugloves.com/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://openuk.uk/openuk-announces-expansion-of-kids-competition-with-digital-summer-camp-3000-minimu-glove-kit-giveaway/">OpenUK Giveaway: Kids Competition with Digital Summer Camp </a></li>
<li><a href="https://umbrello.kde.org/">Umbrello</a></li>
<li><a href="https://matrix.org/">Matrix</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="transcript">Transcript</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="">Transcript (Coming Soon)</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="contribute">Contribute</h2>
<p>If you see anything to adjust, spelling or context, please feel free to contribute on the <a href="https://gitlab.com/scot-osum/scot-osum.gitlab.io/">Scotland Open Source Users Meetups’s Repo</a></p>Scotland Open Source Users MeetupsBeing in open source has many wonderful opportunities, including traveling the world and meeting some inspirational people. One of its biggest appeals is that we can see it changing the world and can impact those that use it for the better…Ep03 - Exploitation of FOSS developers, Education and PR to help projects with Greg Sutcliffe2020-07-07T00:00:00+00:002020-07-07T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/podcasts/2020/07/07/sosum-podcast-s01-ep03<p>Open source developers now a days find themselves doing work for the sake of exposure because we have become accustomed to the “portfolio building” aspect of getting noticed within the community. But this isn’t how it should be…
In this episode we talk to long time open source veteran Greg Sutcliffe, a community data scientist and part of the community team on the Ansible project. We explore the exploitations of open source developers and working for exposure is something we should not encourage. We discuss and contemplate how to encourage companies and government funded institutes to adopt open source from in-house developers, specific PR efforts and education on open source business models.</p>
<p><a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/episode/37377465" data-resource="episode_id=37377465" data-width="100%" data-height="200px" data-theme="light" data-playlist="false" data-playlist-continuous="false" data-autoplay="false" data-live-autoplay="false" data-chapters-image="true" data-episode-image-position="right" data-hide-logo="false" data-hide-likes="false" data-hide-comments="false" data-hide-sharing="false" data-hide-download="true">Listen to “Ep03 - Exploitation of FOSS developers, Education and PR to help projects with Greg Sutcliffe” on Spreaker.</a></p>
<h2 id="shownotes">Shownotes</h2>
<ul>
<li>1:28 - How did you start your journey into open source and what about it applied to you?</li>
<li>2:21 - First steps in open source was because of an iPod</li>
<li>3:15 - Joined the local Linux User Group - Falkirk</li>
<li>3:47 - What made you think to give back to the community?</li>
<li>4:42 - Aha! Here is a project I can contribute to (Foreman)</li>
<li>5:40 - How did you get recruited by Redhat through your contributions to Foreman?</li>
<li>6:29 - My boss saw that he got more from me if we contributed to the project as a whole instead of building from scratch</li>
<li>7:25 - Do stuff that no one wants to do, you’ll get thanks from the maintainers at least</li>
<li>8:43 - We now see open source contributors having to contribute as part of a portfolio building - “free exposure”</li>
<li>10:18 - What kind of advice would you give to both contributors or companies that want to be recruited or to recruit in the community?</li>
<li>11:41 - As a company, its a bit obvious who your good contributors are</li>
<li>12:35 - From an agency persepective embedding themselves within the community is good advice to see who to recruit</li>
<li>13:05 - Diversity in the community, specifically who contributors work for</li>
<li>14:08 - First day at RedHat</li>
<li>14:54 - What can open source technologies or communities do to help businesses that are struggling with during lockdown?</li>
<li>16:22 - Research shows that working from home is more productive</li>
<li>17:30 - Dare I say may need more marketing [for open source software]</li>
<li>18:20 - People find a hinderance of open source is the lack of support</li>
<li>19:44 - Public money, Public code</li>
<li>20:20 - Outsourcing versus In-house developers running open source platform</li>
<li>21:37 - Do we have enough open source experts to talk to companies?</li>
<li>21:55 - People who get involved in open source are not usually from PR or Marketing background</li>
<li>22:23 - How to change this mindset? In Universities or education?</li>
<li>22:51 - Not enough open source or even technology experts</li>
<li>23:21 - Raspberry Pis helps children to learn by “breaking” and not affecting the family’s PC</li>
<li>24:32 - Stirling University had a workshop of open source</li>
<li>25:42 - PR is abit of a dirty word to us techies, but it shouldn’t be</li>
<li>26:14 - Some of most successful open source project had marketing teams behind the project</li>
<li>27:19 - Projects can get lost among others but PR should be able to help</li>
<li>28:35 - Who is the priority to market to?</li>
<li>30:08 - With the broad adoption then in theory it should help towards the funding situation</li>
<li>30:38 - There are other business models that companies should be educated on</li>
<li>32:53 - Have you got any current projects at the moment?</li>
<li>33:17 - R stats community, working on a NextCloud package</li>
<li>34:21 - Love to get back into stuff, extremely interested in education</li>
<li>35:14 - How can people reach you?</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="resources">Resources</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://emeraldreverie.org">Website: Greg Sutcliffe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/Gwmngilfen">Twitter: @Gwmngilfen</a></li>
<li><a href="https://fosstodon.org/@gwmngilfen">Fediverse: @gwmngilfen@fosstodon.org</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.ansible.com/">Ansible</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.ansible.com/blog/author/the-ansible-community-team">Ansible: Community Team</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/redhat">RedHat: Twitter</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/techmeetup">Falkirk Linux User Group:TechMeetup</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.theforeman.org/">Foreman</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/teamrglasgow?lang=en">R Group (Glasgow)</a></li>
<li><a href="https://rundel.github.io/ghclass/">GHClass</a></li>
<li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/keynote_vibrant_developer_community/">Jenkins Keynote @ FOSDEM 2013</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="transcript">Transcript</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://scot-osum.gitlab.io/transcripts/2020-07-07-sosum-podcast-s01-ep03-transcript.html">Transcript (unformatted)</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="contribute">Contribute</h2>
<p>If you see anything to adjust, spelling or context, please feel free to contribute on the <a href="https://gitlab.com/scot-osum/scot-osum.gitlab.io/">Scotland Open Source Users Meetups’s Repo</a></p>Scotland Open Source Users MeetupsOpen source developers now a days find themselves doing work for the sake of exposure because we have become accustomed to the “portfolio building” aspect of getting noticed within the community. But this isn’t how it should be… In this episode we talk to long time open source veteran Greg Sutcliffe, a community data scientist and part of the community team on the Ansible project. We explore the exploitations of open source developers and working for exposure is something we should not encourage. We discuss and contemplate how to encourage companies and government funded institutes to adopt open source from in-house developers, specific PR efforts and education on open source business models.Ep02 - Ensuring longevity after unfortunate circumstances in OSS Projects with Gary Ewan Park2020-06-22T00:00:00+00:002020-06-22T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/podcasts/2020/06/22/sosum-podcast-s01-ep02<p>It’s a not a topic that us open source maintainers and contributors want to think about too often. What if I get hit by a bus tomorrow? What happens to my code and all the users that utilise it?
In this episode we invite Gary Ewan Park, a senior software developer from the core team at the Chocolatey project, to talk about his experiences when the unfortunate situation of one of their package maintainers had sadly passed away. How the project had to approach this difficult situation, leading to the project to place mechanisms and structure in place to promote and ensure the longevity of their package maintainers code. We also talk about the expectation of inactivity with FOSS contributors, including an experience within the Cake community, which Ewan is also part of the core team, and how teaching contributors about these aspects as soon as possible and means of seeing if a package is potentially abandoned.</p>
<p><a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/episode/32441042" data-resource="episode_id=32441042" data-width="100%" data-height="200px" data-theme="light" data-playlist="false" data-playlist-continuous="false" data-autoplay="false" data-live-autoplay="false" data-chapters-image="true" data-episode-image-position="right" data-hide-logo="false" data-hide-likes="false" data-hide-comments="false" data-hide-sharing="false" data-hide-download="true">Listen to “Ep02 - Ensuring longevity after unfortunate circumstances in OSS Projects with Gary Ewan Park” on Spreaker.</a></p>
<h2 id="shownotes">Shownotes</h2>
<ul>
<li>1:02 - How did you start your journey into open source?</li>
<li>2:35 - How did become from being a Chocolatey community member to a full time employee?</li>
<li>4:50 - Do you find there are many job opportunities for Scottish open source developers?</li>
<li>6:40 - How are you handling the current lockdown working remotely for an OSS project as well as being a parent of young kids?</li>
<li>7:49 - Do you find COVID-19 has affected other of the contributors in terms of an increase or decrease in activity?</li>
<li>9:02 - Its hard to see the life of either a contributor or maintainer and how situations affect them causing slow down in activity or a complete lack of. Have you experience that in your own projects?</li>
<li>11:44 - The maintainer of an add-on within the Cake project has sadly passed away and they had all sole ownership of it.</li>
<li>13:40 - Unable to take over the package on GitHub due to their policy, Nuget has also updated their Deceased User policy to require evidence of death.</li>
<li>16:40 - How did the maintainers of the community feel about the new structure of the project and requesting they joined the project’s repository organisation to allow access to their code.</li>
<li>19:41 - Is there any plan to share that GitHub feature to the other members of the Community?</li>
<li>20:30 - Do you have any visibility on a contributor’s increase or decrease in activity to anticipate that you may need to reach out and see if they need any help?</li>
<li>23:12 - One particular package maintainer disappeared story, they got married.</li>
<li>24:50 - FOSS projects often don’t have documentation on how to handle these types of situations (death, inactivity, abandonment). How did your project learn to document and act upon this situation when it arise?</li>
<li>27:50 - There is a mechanisms in NuGet to help Cake project related packages highlight new contributors and then reach out and discuss immediately the longevity of the code.</li>
<li>30:14 - Do you have any thoughts or ideas, whether it’s tools or documentation, to help projects consider and prepare how they should handle these situations?</li>
<li>33:30 - Being proactive and reactive to situations. How inactivity has an affect on the project itself it’s users.</li>
<li>34:41 - Thank you for joining! Where can people find you?</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="resources">Resources</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.gep13.co.uk/">Website: Gary Ewan Park</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/gep13">Twitter: @gep13</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.twitch.tv/gep13">Twitch: @gep13</a></li>
<li><a href="https://chocolatey.org/">Chocolatey</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/chocolateynuget">Twitter: @Chocolatey</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.nuget.org/">Nuget</a></li>
<li><a href="https://cakebuild.net/">Cake Build</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/cakebuildnet">Twitter: @CakeBuild</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/cakecontrib">Twitter: @CakeContrib</a></li>
<li><a href="https://help.github.com/en/github/site-policy/github-deceased-user-policy">GitHub Deceased User Policy</a></li>
<li><a href="https://help.github.com/en/github/setting-up-and-managing-your-github-user-account/maintaining-ownership-continuity-of-your-user-accounts-repositories">GitHub Successor feature</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="transcript">Transcript</h2>
<p>Coming Soon!</p>Scotland Open Source Users MeetupsIt’s a not a topic that us open source maintainers and contributors want to think about too often. What if I get hit by a bus tomorrow? What happens to my code and all the users that utilise it? In this episode we invite Gary Ewan Park, a senior software developer from the core team at the Chocolatey project, to talk about his experiences when the unfortunate situation of one of their package maintainers had sadly passed away. How the project had to approach this difficult situation, leading to the project to place mechanisms and structure in place to promote and ensure the longevity of their package maintainers code. We also talk about the expectation of inactivity with FOSS contributors, including an experience within the Cake community, which Ewan is also part of the core team, and how teaching contributors about these aspects as soon as possible and means of seeing if a package is potentially abandoned.Ep01 - Hackerspaces in Northern Scotland with Tom Jones2020-05-27T00:00:00+00:002020-05-27T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/podcasts/2020/05/27/sosum-podcast-s01-ep01<p>Super excited to welcome everyone to Scotland Open Source first episode! We have the amazing pleasure of speaking to Tom Jones, an extremely successful tech and hackerspace organiser and FreeBSD contributor. We chat about our experiences with open source in education, hackerspaces in Aberdeen, fantastic advice on organising meetups, campGND, FreeBSD and Google Summer of Code.</p>
<p><a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/episode/28478521" data-resource="episode_id=28478521" data-width="100%" data-height="200px" data-theme="light" data-playlist="false" data-playlist-continuous="false" data-autoplay="false" data-live-autoplay="false" data-chapters-image="true" data-episode-image-position="right" data-hide-logo="false" data-hide-likes="false" data-hide-comments="false" data-hide-sharing="false" data-hide-download="true">Listen to “Ep01: Hackerspaces in Northern Scotland with Tom Jones” on Spreaker.</a></p>
<h2 id="shownotes">Shownotes</h2>
<ul>
<li>1:37 - How did you begin your journey in open source? And what about it appealed to you?</li>
<li>3:07 - What was your experiences with open source and education when you attended Uni?</li>
<li>6:37 - How did that lead you into 57North hacklab as one of the founders?</li>
<li>9:14 - What contributed to its (57North hacklab) success?</li>
<li>11:42 - The distribution of open source communities in Scotland especially in Aberdeen - NorthernRST</li>
<li>13:43 - What is the key aspect keeping a meetup or a conference sustainable?</li>
<li>18:15 - Striving for open source within your technology stack. How would you encourage others to reach this?</li>
<li>20:55 - Google Summer of Code & FreeBSD</li>
<li>25:55 - campGND 29th - 31st May 2020</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="resources">Resources</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://campgnd.com/">campGND</a></li>
<li><a href="https://northernrst.com/">NorthernRST</a></li>
<li><a href="https://57north.co/">57North Hacklab</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.twitch.tv/tjhacking/">Twitch: @tjhacking</a></li>
<li><a href="https://adventurist.me/">Website: https://adventurist.me/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://mastodon.social/@_tj">Mastodon: @_tj@mastodon.social</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/adventureloop">Twitter: adventureloop</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.freebsd.org/">FreeBSD</a></li>
<li><a href="https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/">Google Summer of Code</a></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="transcript">Transcript</h2>
<p>Coming Soon!</p>Scotland Open Source Users MeetupsSuper excited to welcome everyone to Scotland Open Source first episode! We have the amazing pleasure of speaking to Tom Jones, an extremely successful tech and hackerspace organiser and FreeBSD contributor. We chat about our experiences with open source in education, hackerspaces in Aberdeen, fantastic advice on organising meetups, campGND, FreeBSD and Google Summer of Code.Open source licenses and enterprise adoption2019-11-12T00:00:00+00:002019-11-12T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/blog/2019/11/12/meeting-notes<p>There are a number of different licenses available in open source, and all of those approved by the Open Source Initiative allow a base set of rights - but some have additional requirements on top of them, requiring still a firm understanding of licensing issues.</p>
<p>Most notably, there is the difference between so-called “permissive licenses,” and firmer “copyleft” ones. The existence of copyleft notably causes concerns for companies who base their business model on a “secret sauce” method.</p>
<p>This session is intended to cover some of the better known licenses and their requirements (and highlight things that are not required), and then open up to discussion around their various effetcs on adoption in the commercial space. We will not cover in the license overview any licenses not endorsed by the OSI, but the discussion can approach any license we wish to discuss, OSI or not.</p>
<h2 id="the-open-source-initiative">The Open Source Initiative</h2>
<p>The OSI documents, approves and maintains lists of licenses that adhere to the “open source definition.”</p>
<p>Essentially, if something is “open source” then the following are true:</p>
<ul>
<li>the source is available</li>
<li>the software can be used by anybody, for any purpose</li>
<li>the software’s license must not impose restrictions/requirements on co-distributed software</li>
</ul>
<p>There are other points as well, see the full Open Source Definition: <a href="https://opensource.org/osd">https://opensource.org/osd</a></p>
<p>Note that this is not “copylefting.” Software under MIT license when not distributed with corresponding source is not open-source, even if based on open source code.</p>
<h2 id="github">Github</h2>
<p>Github posted in <a href="https://github.blog/2015-03-09-open-source-license-usage-on-github-com/">2015 an overview of license distribution</a> on their platform</p>
<table>
<thead>
<tr>
<th>Rank</th>
<th>License</th>
<th>% of projects</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>1</td>
<td>MIT</td>
<td>44.69%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>2</td>
<td>Other</td>
<td>15.68%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>3</td>
<td>GPLv2</td>
<td>12.96%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>4</td>
<td>Apache</td>
<td>11.19%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>5</td>
<td>GPLv3</td>
<td>8.88%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>6</td>
<td>BSD 3-clause</td>
<td>4.53%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>7</td>
<td>Unlicense</td>
<td>1.87%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>8</td>
<td>BSD 2-clause</td>
<td>1.70%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>9</td>
<td>LGPLv3</td>
<td>1.30%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>10</td>
<td>AGPLv3</td>
<td>1.05%</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p><img src="/assets/license_trend_2015_github.png" alt="" /></p>
<h2 id="code-with-no-stated-license">Code with no stated license</h2>
<p>If code does not have a license, using it may pose legal problems further down the line.</p>
<p>Copyright law by default asserts that from the moment of publication, all rights are reserved to the author. It is up to the author to explicitate any other terms, by way of stating the rights granted. Often this is in the form of a license declaration file or paragraph.</p>
<p>This is different from the <a href="https://unlicense.org/">Unlicense(.org)</a>, which is a public-domaining license.</p>
<h2 id="permissive-licenses">Permissive Licenses</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>In putting together these notes, I used TLDR Legal’s notes, a website that summarises licenses. None of this is legal adivce.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Permissive licenses basically allow anybody to use the software for any purpose, so long as the original authorship notice is retained where it is integrated into another project, or re-distributed. Typically, they also waive any responsibility for the functioning of the software for any purpose (like any other piece of software then).</p>
<h3 id="mit-expat-and-bsd-2-clause-licenses">MIT Expat and BSD 2-clause licenses</h3>
<p>The MIT Expat license makes no demands beyond the basics. You can even incorporate the code into a project that makes any arbitrary restrictions on use. The BSD 2-clause license is similar to the MIT license</p>
<h3 id="bsd-3-clause-and-apache-licenses">BSD 3-clause and Apache licenses</h3>
<p>The BSD 3-clause specifically adds a no-trademark-usage clause. Since trademark law is different from copyright law, this simply clarifies an existing distinction.</p>
<h3 id="cc-0---creative-commons-public-domain-license">CC-0 - Creative Commons Public Domain license</h3>
<p>There is no such thing as a general, implicit “public domain” license. The Creative Commons project created the CC-0 (“CC Zero”) to allow people to have a license similar to public domain. It was written with multimedia use in mind, rather than software source code.</p>
<p>It is even more permissive than MIT and BSD licenses in that it effectively does not even require any recognition to the original authors be placed anywhere, and stands in as a more acceptable alternative to the WTFPL.</p>
<p>Compare also the <a href="https://unlicense.org/">Unlicense</a>.</p>
<h2 id="copyleft-licenses">Copyleft Licenses</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>In putting together these notes, I used the <a href="https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html">GNU.org’s FAQ notes</a>. None of this is legal advice.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Copyleft licenses are deeply tied to the FSF’s concept of the Four Freedoms (starting with Freedom Zero, as behooves C practitioners and their language inheritants!). Recipients of copylefted software are meant to be guaranteed these freedoms.</p>
<p>These freedoms are</p>
<ul>
<li>0: To use the software for whatever purpose</li>
<li>1: To modify the software as the user desires</li>
<li>2: To distribute the software to anybody</li>
<li>3: To distribute the changes and the changed software for the benefit of all</li>
</ul>
<p>Licenses that espouse this are typically curated by the Free Software Foundation, under the GNU licenses.</p>
<ul>
<li>GPL v2.1</li>
<li>LGPL v2.1</li>
<li>GPL v3</li>
<li>LGPL v3</li>
<li>AGPL</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="gnu-general-public-license-v21--v3">GNU General Public License v2.1 & v3</h3>
<p>Full-GPL licenses are copyleft - that is, if you integrate code or explicitly link to code that is under GPL, in a way that your code and the GPL’d code constitute a single program as-distributed, then your code must grant and perpetuate the same rights as the GPL’d code.</p>
<p>If you use a program to produce or process code in any way, but do not use the program’s code in your deliverable, the GPL does not apply.</p>
<p>The version 3 of the license was created to counter manufacturers’ practice of preventing the running of modified software on the devices they sell (“Tivoization,” as it is called by the FSF).</p>
<h3 id="gnu-lesser-gpl-v21--v3">GNU Lesser GPL v2.1 & v3</h3>
<p>LGPL licenses are more lenient - they only cover the development of libraries. If you modify the library in the context of your application, any changes to the library must be under LGPL, but the wider program itself needn’t be.</p>
<h3 id="gnu-affero-gpl">GNU Affero GPL</h3>
<p>AGPL on the other hand is more stringent than the GPL - if your software is interacted with at all over a network, you must be able to provide the source code to whomever is legitimately allowed to access it.</p>
<h2 id="compliance-with-copyleft-licenses">Compliance with copyleft licenses</h2>
<p>To comply with a license there are two popular solutions:</p>
<ul>
<li>Actually do what the license tells you to</li>
<li>Stop using the code that is under that license</li>
</ul>
<p>So if GPL code is integrated into an incompatible code base (proprietary, or other incompatible OSI license, either way) there are two remedies:</p>
<ul>
<li>Actively relicense the product under GPL and release the source code</li>
<li>Or just stop using the GPL portion, and cease distributing the versions that do have the GPL code in it</li>
</ul>
<p>Note: the GPL terms apply when including GPL code into your codebase. <em>It has no bearing on simply using the software.</em></p>
<h3 id="compliance-not-money">Compliance, not money</h3>
<p>This follows from the Free Software Foundation’s enforcement guidelines:</p>
<blockquote>
<ul>
<li>Our primary goal in GPL enforcement is to bring about GPL compliance</li>
<li>Legal action is a last resort. Compliance actions are primarily education and assistance processes to aid those who are not following the license.</li>
<li>Confidentiality can increase receptiveness and responsiveness.
<ul>
<li>(…) in compliance work, initiating and continuing discussions in private demonstrates good faith, provides an opportunity to teach compliance without fear of public reprisal, and offers a chance to fix honest mistakes.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Community-oriented enforcement must never prioritize financial gain.</li>
</ul>
</blockquote>
<p>There are some additional points as well - see <a href="https://www.fsf.org/licensing/enforcement-principles">https://www.fsf.org/licensing/enforcement-principles</a></p>
<h3 id="a-viral-gpl">A “viral” GPL</h3>
<p>Note that if code that came in under GPL would cause your whole project to be subject to the GPL in principle, the reverse act of removing the GPL code from the project returns it to being “whatever you want.”</p>
<h2 id="questions">Questions</h2>
<p>Questions for the audience</p>
<ul>
<li>Have you ever explicitly not used software because of its license?</li>
<li>Has your company explicitly prevented use of open source software? Your management chain? How extensively?</li>
<li>Does your management chain seem to have a favourable or unfavourable view of open source?</li>
<li>Is it preferable to license under a permissive license, or under a copyleft license?</li>
<li>By what means of workflows do you combine libraries and software under different licenses?</li>
<li>Do you see use cases in your own projects (not the company you work for) for not releasing your software under an open source license?</li>
</ul>
<p>Questions that would require a lawyer</p>
<ul>
<li>If I write plugins or mods for a program that is under a GPL license, does that constitute “linking to form a single program”?</li>
<li>What if software I did not intend to release is received by another party? Do they have the right to request the source code?</li>
</ul>
<h1 id="resources">Resources</h1>
<ul>
<li>The Open Source Definition: <a href="https://opensource.org/osd">https://opensource.org/osd</a></li>
<li>TLDR Legal: <a href="https://tldrlegal.com/">https://tldrlegal.com/</a></li>
<li>GNU FAQ <a href="https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html">https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html</a>
<ul>
<li>GNU Compatibility table: <a href="https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#AllCompatibility">https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#AllCompatibility</a></li>
<li>General compatibility notes: <a href="https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-compatibility.html">https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-compatibility.html</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Copyleft Comprehensive Guide <a href="https://copyleft.org/guide/comprehensive-gpl-guide.html">https://copyleft.org/guide/comprehensive-gpl-guide.html</a></li>
<li>FSF Enforcement Principles: <a href="https://www.fsf.org/licensing/enforcement-principles">https://www.fsf.org/licensing/enforcement-principles</a></li>
</ul>Tai KedzierskiThere are a number of different licenses available in open source, and all of those approved by the Open Source Initiative allow a base set of rights - but some have additional requirements on top of them, requiring still a firm understanding of licensing issues.Session notes from Funding Open Source Projects2019-08-11T00:00:00+00:002019-08-11T00:00:00+00:00https://scot-osum.gitlab.io/2019/08/11/meeting-notes<h1 id="scotland-osum---funding-open-source-projects--a-guided-conversation">Scotland OSUM - Funding Open Source Projects : a Guided Conversation</h1>
<p>Thank you to all who attended our inaugural event! We were able to have an informative session on the topic of the methods and effects around funding open source projects, exchanging opinions and stories. The following is a summary of the conclusions, some notes on a few of the points raised with some post-event checking up, and underneath are the questions and answers provided during the Guided Conversation session.</p>
<h2 id="summary">Summary</h2>
<p>A few takeaways from the session stand out:</p>
<p>Firstly, it is not a given that all projects want to be funded, either via crowd-sourcing or company backing - many projects are maintained as a side-item for fun or originated as an exercise. If they become popular and even a key technology, it is by accident. Maintainers of such projects may want to keep income separate from their projects. There are plenty of ways to keep these projects going, including donating time, and assistance, and community management.</p>
<p>For those that want to be funded, some simply do not feel they have a case to present to ask for funding. There is a perception around raising funds in which maintainers may feel they have to “sell” the project forward, in the same way that a company does - the OpenSSL or Slackware projects received only a modest amount of financial and code-contribution help when it was discovered their maintainers were struggling to keep up. The concept of “funding” or “donation” feels like a pressure on future activities, rather than a payment for work already done, and making forward commitments due to money can be scary.</p>
<p>Funding is also perceived as a double-edged blade, which might allow maintainers to move the project from being a hobby to being a full-time job and be paid for their work, but at the same time money can make a project become a burden, and tie maintainers to expectations and outside influence, leading both to a loss of control of a project, or vocal community backlashes. Setting up an entity that dissociates the maintainers personally from the project requires administrative time and skills, as does managing what sources to accept income from, or to whom to apply to, as well as managing the transparency of expenses carefully. When projects start down this path, they become more like businesses, and become perceived as such, with the community/public expectations that come with it. At the end of the day, most open source developers are just developers - not business people, and accepting money could force this change upon them.</p>
<p>As an addendum from me, Tai, I did try to look up a couple of the points I felt needed checking up on:</p>
<ol>
<li>OpenSSL received some donations, but <a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/openssl-needs-corporate-funding-to-avoid-heartbleed-repeat/">not nearly as much</a> as represents their relevance to the industry. Both the OpenSSL Software Foundation president Steve Marquess and Theo de Raadt of OpenBSD highlighted the problem of large corporations taking their technology, turning a profit, and giving nothing back</li>
<li>As a result of Heartbleed, the Linux Foundation initiated the <a href="https://www.linuxfoundation.org/press-release/2014/10/linux-foundations-core-infrastructure-initiative-issues-call-for-grant-proposals/">Core Infrastructure Initiative</a>, but it seems it has <a href="https://www.coreinfrastructure.org">put out little since 2018</a></li>
<li>There are a number of grant funds that can be applied to if a project wishes to - the <a href="https://www.linux.com/news/how-find-funding-open-source-project">Linux Foundation once published a list</a> to this effect</li>
<li>The Slackware maintainer, Patrick Volkerdink, <a href="https://www.patreon.com/slackwarelinux/overview">set up a Patreon</a> (<a href="https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/slackware-14/is-this-patreon-account-legit-4175658493/page4.html#post6021503">verified through his forum account</a>) which is currently (August 2019) at $900 per month. Not modern salary level, but hopefully he can keep the lights on</li>
<li>A previous attempt at <a href="https://hackernoon.com/why-funding-open-source-is-hard-652b7055569d">providing a managed funding solution</a> was made, but eventually shut down when Github cut off their source of clicks
<ul>
<li>a number of reasons why developers tend not to want to manage funding are covered in this article, of which the requirement to step away from code as a result</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Another article on <a href="https://opensource.guide/getting-paid/">opensource.guide</a> highlights the challenges of getting funded, and lists some options, with success examples.
<ul>
<li>For every success though, there are tens of thousands of failed attempts - it is still recognised as “rare” and “extremely difficult”</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ol>
<p>One last, very underrated way to help ensure a project survives which was highlighted as a last point to the last question: <em>seek to be kind to the maintainers</em>. Clément Lefebvre of Linux Mint <a href="https://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=3736">posted an article in April 2019</a> linking to an older post by <a href="https://feaneron.com/2019/03/28/on-being-a-free-software-maintainer/">George Stavracas, maintainer of GNOME Calendar</a> about the negative aspects of being a Free Software maintainer. It boils eventually down to this: “<em>Unfortunately, being a free software maintainer may have a high price to your psychological and emotional health.</em>” The problem of user outrage can be amplified by funding, contributing perhaps to some fear of it. Contributing is not always funding, or code, or troubleshooting. Contributing can also be thanking, and making the thanks louder than the ire.</p>
<h1 id="questions">Questions</h1>
<h2 id="1-what-ways-are-there-to-fund-foss-projects-and-their-teams">1. What ways are there to fund FOSS projects and their teams?</h2>
<ul>
<li>Donations - voluntary financial contributions</li>
<li><a href="https://www.bountysource.com/">Bounty Source</a> - a feature or bug gets registered, and money pledged against it. As more users pledge to the specific bug/feature, it raises in priority. Developers of that feature receive the funds</li>
<li><a href="https://www.linux.com/news/how-find-funding-open-source-project">Grants</a> - the EU (see Horizon 2020 initiative), the UK government and other bodies provide grants upon application</li>
<li>Hiring developers - for example, hiring the core developer of a project into a company, and either building on their work, or providing time for them to maintain the OSS project whilst at the company</li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/sponsors">Github Sponsors</a></li>
<li><a href="http://opencollective.com/">Open Collective</a> - a platform for collecting funds and expensing, and providing a Fiscal Host for a group of people, so as to avoid having to form a legal entity</li>
<li>For web apps, providing a hosted version with a pay-for model, encapsulated in a company</li>
<li>Selling consultancy and support as a business</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="2-whose-responsibility-is-it-to-maintain-the-sustainability-of-a-foss-project-maintainers-contributors-or-consumers">2. Whose responsibility is it to maintain the sustainability of a FOSS project? Maintainers, contributors or consumers?</h2>
<p>Maintainers should ensure the success of the project - it forms the basis as to “why” the project should be supported, and the greater its deployment/usage popularity, the better its chances at being funded. Contributors to the project themselves have effectively paid with their time, so it feels that the burden of sustainability keeping is not theirs to ensure. Consumers of the project - be they end users or companies who make use of the project - should proactively play their part in ensuring the project can keep the lights on.</p>
<p>(edit note:</p>
<ul>
<li>developers <a href="https://hackernoon.com/why-funding-open-source-is-hard-652b7055569d">don’t usually want to change roles</a> to business maintainer</li>
<li>even when they do, large companies often <a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/openssl-needs-corporate-funding-to-avoid-heartbleed-repeat/">don’t behave responsibly</a></li>
</ul>
<p>)</p>
<h2 id="3-what-benefits-would-an-foss-project-get-from-receiving-funding">3. What benefits would an FOSS project get from receiving funding?</h2>
<p>Benefits perceived include</p>
<ul>
<li>relaxing the operational pressure, from a financial point of view (e.g. cost of running a website, hosted storage, for some like Linux distros this is monthly bandwidth or maintaining a Content Distribution Network subscription, etc)</li>
<li>Potential to be able to scale a project if there is enough funding to start hiring developers</li>
<li>Allowing disparate teams of developers to meet in-person</li>
</ul>
<p>A concern for some is the spending of funds “appropriately;” it was pointed out that generally if the project mis-spends the funds, future donations can be negatively impacted, so this self-regulates for the most part.</p>
<p>There were also concerns raised about the effects of receiving funding - some projects likely choose not to be funded deliberately.</p>
<ul>
<li>When funded, there is a higher pressure to deliver on-demand, which is undesirable for small or boutique projects that did not intend critical success</li>
<li>It potentially turns what was meant to be a fun project into a job, often alongside a full time job</li>
<li>Monthly funding is preferable to one-time cash donations, for reasons of predictability</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="4-what-perception-do-people-have-of-financially-donating-to-a-foss-project">4. What perception do people have of financially donating to a FOSS project?</h2>
<p>The terms “donation” was quickly called out as being problematic - it gives the impression of being a charity. This can set false expectations, both for developers and for funders. It cultivates the idea of giving out of pity, rather than recognising the service rendered by maintaining important software.</p>
<p>Some developers include a small statement in their Read-Me files asking for “beer money” tips, for small projects sometimes this feels appropriate when little is expected.</p>
<p>There is also a perception that each funder has a limited “donations budget” so figuring out who “deserves” funding more can also be a thorny issue.</p>
<h2 id="5-what-barriers-would-prevent-projects-from-receiving-donations-or-funding">5. What barriers would prevent projects from receiving donations or funding?</h2>
<p>The first barrier to seeking funding is the previously-raised concern about being “tied to obligations” when funding is involved; the perceived pressure to “deliver” is too much if the project didn’t begin as a means for a living.</p>
<p>There are also issues relating to registering a legal entity, sorting out tax and other legal matters, and maintaining the legal status for being able to receive the funds.</p>
<p>Finally in a group of peers, this forces the designation of a “lead person” who makes decisions on behalf of the group - and to decide how to spend the funds, or even apportion them if required.</p>
<h2 id="6-what-impact-can-receiving-a-large-financial-support-have-on-the-projects-community">6. What impact can receiving a large financial support have on the project’s community?</h2>
<p>Questions are raised about receiving funding from a company that the community considers as “bad,” in which case there could be a schism in the community - forks can be born this way.</p>
<p>Several examples and anecdotes were shared.</p>
<p>Mozilla receiving money from Google was perceived as a betrayal of their core values to an extent, and had to cut that association eventually. There is an anti-corporate sentiment in some OSS communities which marks as “betrayal” any company-based funding.</p>
<p>The acquisition of Github by Microsoft produced a lot of ship-jumping, to Gitlab’s benefit - Microsoft despite some good showing recently still is perceived by many OSS communities as being a harmful corporation.</p>
<p>Conversely, Blender received notable funding from Ubisoft and Epic Games, two gaming industry heavy-weights. The licenses for professional 3D modelling suites are extremely high, and as a result there is an appetite in the industry to have an alternative that is more affordable, and putting money to the furthering of Blender makes sense for this industry, and the 3D modelling community in general, so goals remain aligned so far, and if it becomes the standard in teaching 3D, then this benefits the companies who hire graduates trained on Blender.</p>
<p>PyPi had an ancient code base for its servers, and to migrate the infrastructure would cost heavily; the Mozilla Foundation weighed in with a financial donation to enable hiring of consultants to help make the transition. Community seems to have not been affected, though the Mozilla Foundation has a positive image overall, which helps.</p>
<p>There is also a question of whether the project’s development and direction can be influenced by a key funder. As such, transparency is preferred as a means to maintain visibility in the community as to the direction of the project, and continue to be an influence itself on the project.</p>
<p>Krita funds each major release with its own Kickstarter campaign, and has successfully delivered; in this case the goals are set up front, and the funds are crowd-sourced with tiers and pre-approved perks, which mitigates some concerns of influence - it essentially states influencibility through perks, upfront.</p>
<h2 id="7-would-donators-expect-conditions-as-part-of-funding-if-so-what-would-be-reasonable-conditions">7. Would donators expect conditions as part of funding? If so what would be reasonable conditions?</h2>
<p>The question specifically meant to ask, whether donators could expect to be able to impose conditions on the funding.</p>
<p>To start with, it was raised that under US jurisdiction, a donation cannot be tied to conditions, else it forms a contract to engage services and becomes a business transaction.</p>
<p>A donation should then be regarded as an expansion of trust, faith that the project will continue to operate within its frame of ideals, and continue to do good work, as it has done in the past. The funder pays as a recognition of past goodness, and invests in continued future goodness.</p>
<p>A point was raised that it could be viewed as OK to impose conditions on funding, if the conditions were in-line with the projects’ goals and directions; counter-argument was that if the conditions were already in-line with the project, then they weren’t really “conditions.”</p>
<h2 id="8-what-level-of-transparency-of-expense-would-people-expect">8. What level of transparency of expense would people expect?</h2>
<p>The sentiment was that more transparency was expected of larger projects, but not so much as itemized bill expenses, but rather what sub-projects, efforts or campaigns were being spent on. For smaller projects, it was felt that transparency whilst good, was less of a concern. Of note is that if a project expresses ideals, or has as its core mission to further an ethical value, a more precise level of transparency is often expected.</p>
<p>Open Collective, as a method for collecting funds and using them, is focused on fully transparent accounting as the norm. Expenses are submitted openly, and paid for with funds residing with the project. Core members approve the expense, and the fiscal host pays out when funds are available.</p>
<h2 id="9-are-there-different-levels-of-financial-support-expected-by-the-size-of-the-consumer">9. Are there different levels of financial support expected by the size of the consumer?</h2>
<p>If a consumer of a project is a large corporation, is it expected that their contributions should be larger?</p>
<p>Several examples were raised about large corporations donating small, symbolic amounts, then using a charity’s or project’s logo on their own page to say “we supported them.” It is not easy to call out such self-serving and essentially “insulting” behaviour, as creating a polemic around a donation feels like it could be damaging to the receiver. This briefly raised the question of trademark enforcement.</p>
<p>In the end it seems it is the community that can express expectations, rather than the core developers/maintainers. As a potential customer, we would buy from a company that supported OSS projects properly, rather than one which was disingenuous. Here, transparency in funding sources helps make this evident.</p>
<h2 id="10-how-would-foss-projects-motivate-consumers-to-financially-support-them">10. How would FOSS projects motivate consumers to financially support them?</h2>
<p>Examples were raised about the OpenSSL and Slackware maintainers who were found to have been severely underfunded, to a point of poverty. Upon this discovery, a massive swell of donations came forward - so one motivation seemed to be to “just ask,” especially if the project is a popular one.</p>
<p>The corollary question was raised as to “why did they not ask sooner?” There’s potentially a perception that it is presumptuous to ask for money when the maintainer sees their project as a side-project, or as simply being the enablers of a consumer’s side project, or being too low down the chain. Admitting to oneself that a side project has grown to being a full time responsibility is a big mental step as well, and asking for funding forces this recognition.</p>
<p>Actions that maintainers can take to encourage donation then are</p>
<ul>
<li>simply asking for that support</li>
<li>listing their request in the project’s main readme, and on the front page of the project’s site</li>
<li>ensuring transparency about the costs of running the project</li>
<li>ensuring that projects or products that incorporate your own project make clear mention of this use, so as to ensure visibility of your project is not subsumed into something else</li>
</ul>
<p>(edit note - there’s <a href="https://opensource.guide/getting-paid/">an article that further elaborates on these points</a>)</p>
<h2 id="11-would-there-be-a-need-for-a-marketingfundraising-team-to-raise-funds-for-the-foss-project">11. Would there be a need for a marketing/fundraising team to raise funds for the FOSS project?</h2>
<p>It was noted that “marketing” was not a well-regarded concept amongst engineers. “Marketing” is something you need when you are a company. An open source project on the other hand can leverage a community to spread the word on the project, and push for the project’s widespread adoption and raise its visibility. There is the prevailing notion that developers will ensure a project is “good,” and that wider adoption would build a good case for funding, and that the community would do a lot of the “marketing.”</p>
<p>As to receiving funding, especially from larger corporations, it was recognised that a specialised role would need to be created to be able to perform “business-to-business”-like functions such as negotiating funding, and addressing corporations at industry events to encourage adoption from the top level.</p>
<h2 id="12-what-other-means-of-support-can-be-provided-if-not-an-injection-of-funds">12. What other means of support can be provided if not an injection of funds?</h2>
<p>More of a listing of ideas for the final question:</p>
<ul>
<li>granting server space</li>
<li>donating hardware to support testing</li>
<li>contributing code</li>
<li>performing testing</li>
<li>community moderation</li>
<li>ensuring positive feedback reaches developers, not just negative outcries</li>
<li>documentation writing, technical writers</li>
<li>translators</li>
<li>issue triagers</li>
<li>administration/governance specialists</li>
<li>designers</li>
<li>talks/advocacy</li>
<li>ensuring presence in community help and support (forums, stack overflow, topical/industry forums), providing troubleshooting assistance</li>
<li><a href="https://feaneron.com/2019/03/28/on-being-a-free-software-maintainer/">be kind to the maintainers</a></li>
</ul>Tai KedzierskiScotland OSUM - Funding Open Source Projects : a Guided Conversation