Post AVOurbaifSww1ANEdE by shauna@social.coop
(DIR) More posts by shauna@social.coop
(DIR) Post #AVOurY6pc8G9DbMp84 by kissane@mstdn.social
2023-05-06T20:05:47Z
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I think a good rule of thumb is that if there’s a thing no one does as a hobby, probably very few people will do it for your FOSS project for free
(DIR) Post #AVOurYxIT4E7qJuiuG by henry@mstdn.science
2023-05-06T20:49:33Z
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@kissane Is paying for FOSS a thing? E.g. I would need an app that show random cat pictures. FOSS app exists, only shows dogs. Can I pay an unknown person to help out? Asking for a friend with obscure hobbies.
(DIR) Post #AVOurZopG32qWKxTLE by schmidt_fu@mstdn.social
2023-05-06T21:14:36Z
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@henryThere's a myriad of funding possibilities around FOSS, ranging from Freemium pricing (e.g. IntelliJ), selling support (Red Hat), customizations and hosting (Gitlab), to selling on an appstore (Osmand) to putting bounties on fixing bugs (BugBounty), sponsoring, donating company time, crowdfunding and targeted funding (NLNet, PrototypeFund) - and paid customized integrations.The trouble is to match available resources to possible projects.@kissane
(DIR) Post #AVOuraVMht4YeGrReC by henry@mstdn.science
2023-05-06T21:51:15Z
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@schmidt_fu @kissane Thanks for the thorough reply. Fascinating that there isn’t a “market place” for tweaks, although many larger projects appear to accept general donations. Not sure whether it’s lack of demand, or lack of awareness. Most users opt for off the shelf solutions, knowing that custom software is much more expensive. I was curious about whether there might be something in between.
(DIR) Post #AVOuraymwUbm7WcwVc by shauna@social.coop
2023-05-06T22:54:06Z
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@henry @schmidt_fu @kissane Part of the problem is that most "tweaks" require a large amount of context about the underlying project. Even if you find someone who just so happens to be an expert in all of the technologies the project uses (the language, framework, libraries, etc) they'll still have to learn at least a bit of the underlying architecture, conventions and contribution process.I know plenty of FOSS projects with money but no people to pay to do the work.
(DIR) Post #AVOurbaifSww1ANEdE by shauna@social.coop
2023-05-06T22:54:51Z
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@henry @schmidt_fu @kissane (I've written a little bit about the challenge of building context among open source contributors here: https://governingopen.com/resources/context-building-tasks )
(DIR) Post #AVSOBCbYkycgSbLLX6 by billseitz@toolsforthought.rocks
2023-05-08T14:39:50Z
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@henry @kissane I haven't tried nor witnessed, so have no actual data.
(DIR) Post #AVSOBDVDQ38tFDNnHc by billseitz@toolsforthought.rocks
2023-05-08T17:35:48Z
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@henry @kissane FYI just found this pagehttps://producingoss.com/en/crowdfunding-and-bounties.html
(DIR) Post #AVSOBE51GvmZ2G8O5g by billseitz@toolsforthought.rocks
2023-05-08T17:38:26Z
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@henry @kissane part of @kfogel's Producing #OpenSource Software:How to Run a Successful #FreeSoftware Projecthttps://producingoss.com/en/
(DIR) Post #AVSOBEseIPTtWBM1Ro by kfogel@kfogel.org
2023-05-08T21:00:37.641182Z
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@billseitz @henry @kissane (Thanks, Bill.) I just read over the entire thread. A general point: software development costs what software development costs -- the license on the bits doesn't affect the cost of rearranging those bits or adding new bits in a functionally useful way :-). However, FOSS licensing *does* enable a (usually) well-defined surface area for receiving contributions in a given project.So if you want a change made in a piece of FOSS software, you first hire someone -- a developer, or for larger changes perhaps a development team -- to make that change. What they can deliver to you at that point is the original (upstream) software plus the changes you needed. However, if you've hired the right folks, then process has some extra steps on the front and back:1) They have discussed the changes with the upstream maintainership group (perhaps your developers are even already members of that group, or perhaps not -- either way can work);2) During development and upon completion, the developers perform the social and technical tasks necessary to get the changes accepted permanently into the upstream code base, so that you don't have to maintain a divergent patch set for all eternity.There are plenty of developers who do work like this, and there are companies too (mine is one, but certainly not the only one). The best way to find the appropriate developers is usually to just ask in the project's upstream forums. "Hey, I've got an approximately X-sized development task I'd like to explore that involves this project. This is funded work. Who should I talk to?" If you don't know how to engage in upstream forums, usually any experienced developer who has worked in open source projects can guide you.You may get multiple different answers, when you ask, but that's fine: now you're just making choices in a marketplace, like anyone else who's paying for software development.
(DIR) Post #AVScGS3Y8PeBBjpgJc by billseitz@toolsforthought.rocks
2023-05-08T21:34:47Z
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@kfogel @henry @kissane The reality-constraints that can come into play are1. what rate is the OS-dev willing to work for to do something he doesn't personally care about;2. how many hours will a "small" change take?If it's 2hrs x $100/hr then not many "consumers" will want to pay that....Which pushes toward a crowd-funding model... but if you want to facilitate that, and you're not "part of" the base project "team", do you get a piece of the action? (increment-VC, increment-PM)
(DIR) Post #AVScGSgtm77f9mF6eG by kfogel@kfogel.org
2023-05-08T23:38:27.769941Z
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@billseitz @henry @kissane Well, good developers won't take on jobs that they don't have enough motivation (intrinsic or extrinsic) to do well; that concern isn't specific to FOSS work.As for amount: $200 to land any change, even a trivial one, in an upstream open source project would be incredibly cheap.It sounds like maybe you're thinking of the funder as an individual who desires a tiny nice-to-have-but-not-absolutely-necessary improvement? IMO it's always hard to get things like that done, because there's a certain minimum overhead to getting anything done in a collaborative software project (whether proprietary or FOSS doesn't even matter much). If I hire a lawn service to mow a single blade of grass, they're not going to charge me 1/100,000th of whatever they would normally charge to mow my lawn.