We like to think tech is meritocratic, but I think a lot of the time it's like a pop song - what becomes a Hit has a lot to do with intangible factors like fashion, being at the right place at the right time & fads & trends.
There's a broader question also here - how open-source can sustainably continue in the future, to make sure contributors are paid but to keep the software free. I don't think anyone has really solved this problem in a sure-fire rinse-and-repeat sort of way that will work every time as of yet. Big projects like Linux have massive corporate investment to keep things moving. . . But for smaller projects, that form the foundations for much bigger projects, the maintainers often work in the shadows as volunteers.
Is it even ethical to accept money for a project to which others have contributed? How could money be shared with contributors? How to fairly decide who gets how much?
And yes, it's a big problem! And deciding fairly how to distribute money - very difficult! A very current example is Hacktober, where even just for a T-shirt some people are making arbitrary small PRs of a single-line documentation tweak to get their commit/PR count up. . . The measurement system is very hard to do when you're dealing with techies who are very good at finding clever ways around the constraints of systems. . .
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We like to think tech is meritocratic, but I think a lot of the time it's like a pop song - what becomes a Hit has a lot to do with intangible factors like fashion, being at the right place at the right time & fads & trends.
There's a broader question also here - how open-source can sustainably continue in the future, to make sure contributors are paid but to keep the software free. I don't think anyone has really solved this problem in a sure-fire rinse-and-repeat sort of way that will work every time as of yet. Big projects like Linux have massive corporate investment to keep things moving. . . But for smaller projects, that form the foundations for much bigger projects, the maintainers often work in the shadows as volunteers.
Agree with this.
Also mine: How open-source can sustainably continue in the future, to make sure my contributors are paid but to keep the software free?
There is an ethical problem here → hackaday.com/2019/07/05/how-not-to...
That's a great link, thanks for sharing!
And yes, it's a big problem! And deciding fairly how to distribute money - very difficult! A very current example is Hacktober, where even just for a T-shirt some people are making arbitrary small PRs of a single-line documentation tweak to get their commit/PR count up. . . The measurement system is very hard to do when you're dealing with techies who are very good at finding clever ways around the constraints of systems. . .