[HN Gopher] Libre Endowment Fund: Sustainable Development of Fre...
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Libre Endowment Fund: Sustainable Development of Free Software
Author : graderjs
Score : 104 points
Date : 2021-10-09 13:08 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.fdl-lef.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.fdl-lef.org)
| scns wrote:
| Readability increases when i choose the Desktop website in
| Bromite. Writes a mental not to send a PR with a fix.
| nomdep wrote:
| " Aside from supporting Free Software solutions, the FDL also
| aims to increase the visibility of European Free Software
| publishers and their importance in terms of innovation and
| employment as well as their contribution to a possible European
| technological sovereignty."
|
| So is for European projects only?
| jpgvm wrote:
| Given the contents of this https://www.fdl-lef.org/FDL-
| Press.Relase.Publication.A.Europ... I don't think you can really
| consider this as supporting FLOSS. They legit called Openstack
| "foreign' software.
| cpach wrote:
| Just wow.
| cycomanic wrote:
| The Andromeda project was about creating a local alternative to
| the largely US-dominated cloud space. Given that, the argument
| that it is counterproductive to push a project which is
| dominated by US and non-european companies (look at the
| foundation members) and where most development expertise is
| outside of Europe, does have some merit no?
| JoshTriplett wrote:
| Open Source can be hosted anywhere, as many people who have
| written software later hosted as a cloud service by Amazon
| have discovered. I don't think there's any merit to rejecting
| an Open Source project on the basis of where its primary
| developers are located.
| jpgvm wrote:
| True open source software is like ideas, it doesn't have
| borders and people that try tell you it does are ignorant at
| best or have ulterior motives.
|
| In this case it's not even true. The commercial entities that
| play a big role in OpenStack are incorporated in the US but
| many of the engineers that do the actual work are located in
| the EU and available for hire in the EU talent pool.
| fanpx wrote:
| "Members are required to have an PhD in Mathematics or Computer
| Science related disciplines as well as being authors of
| FLOSS/Free Software."
|
| First of all, it is "a PhD", secondly, this looks like the
| typical scientific ecosystem power grab that we have seen
| multiple times in the US.
|
| In the Python scientific space, people doing actual work are
| exploited ruthlessly.
| andrewl wrote:
| Regarding the " _an_ PhD" note, I'm finding other phrasing that
| makes me think the writers were not native English speakers.
| It's a French organization after all, so I would expect a few
| errors in their English. They 're not significant.
| diskzero wrote:
| This seems to be an unfortunate manifestation of French tax law
| and culture. This comes off as offensive to those of us who
| came up through, what we may believe, the more egalitarian,
| Silicon Valley entrepreneurship model. A PhD may actually be
| seen as a liability!
|
| It also is grating, as many open source coders and maintainers
| choose to operate outside of both the academic and Silicon
| Valley cultures. Why would they want a committee of academics
| guiding and funding their projects?
|
| All this being said, perhaps there will be positive outcomes
| from this fund.
| smetsjp wrote:
| There is a presentation at FOSDEM 2021 about FDL:
| https://fosdem.org/2021/schedule/event/fosstaxbreak/
|
| Title: Give open source a (tax) break
|
| Cash that gets into FDL/LEF is then spent to sponsor existing
| FLOSS projects or to acquire intellectual property rights of
| existing works and change their license to FLOSS.
|
| Case 1: https://bossanova.uk/jspreadsheet/v4/ got financed
| partly by FDL/LEF
|
| Case 2: the radio hardware of the Open Radio Station (a 4G/5G
| vRAN base station based on Amarisoft stack and SlapOS) is in
| the process of being acquired and released as open source
| hardware. See
| https://shop.rapid.space/product_module/241/Resource_viewAsS...
|
| The requirement for PhD is here to ensure that all projects
| that are financed by FDL/LEF have some kind of general interest
| or innovation, something which is useful to comply with Tax Law
| indymike wrote:
| So only a PhD can innovate?
| fermigier wrote:
| As stated in my previous comment, the PhD requirement is
| for sitting on the selection committee only.
| indymike wrote:
| Is only a PhD is capable of recognizing libre software
| deserving of support?
| fermigier wrote:
| Nowhere is it implied that this could be true.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| Well, they have no hope of getting tenure (that budget is
| needed for administration), so it's good that PhD have
| another option where they can avoid doing any real work* ;)
|
| * Giving people whose talent is thinking the chance to do
| that is a good idea. Better than losing that talent to
| management.
| solarkraft wrote:
| > ensure that all projects that are financed by FDL/LEF have
| some kind of general interest or innovation
|
| How does it ensure that?
| fermigier wrote:
| The selection process is described in details here:
| https://www.fdl-lef.org/process/
|
| (Disclaimer: I'm one of the members of the selection
| committee. Ask me if you need more clarification).
| [deleted]
| cycomanic wrote:
| Reading the website this is for committee members only (it has
| nothing to do with if a project is eligible). This seems to
| largely be a requirement for tax reasons.
|
| As a side note, I find it unfortunate that often when things
| like this get posted, e.g. a foundation who supports free-
| software in this case, the first posts are not "this is a great
| thing", but instead someone goes through the website until they
| find something they disagree with and creates a negative debate
| and misinformation (several people here already understood the
| sentence to mean that projects led by non-PhDs can't apply).
| shadowfox wrote:
| It is the "law of the topmost comment" [1] in action
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26357974
| cpach wrote:
| That's an ... interesting requirement. In France there is,
| AFAIK, an exaggerated emphasis on the importance of holding a
| PhD title. IMHO I can't really see the strong connection
| between acquiring an PhD and the ability to successfully lead
| open source projects.
| fermigier wrote:
| As stated on the web site: "In order to be eligible to act on
| the committee, members are required to have an PhD in
| Mathematics or Computer Science related disciplines as well
| as being authors of FLOSS/Free Software. We are currently
| looking for new committee members." -> The PhD requirement is
| for sitting on the selection committee only.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > The PhD requirement is for sitting on the selection
| committee only.
|
| Yeah... but why? What attribute do you think is unique to
| people with PhDs?
| fermigier wrote:
| I don't believe that people with PhDs have "unique
| attributes". There are, specially in the field of
| computing science, examples of exceptionally gifted and
| influential researchers without PhDs (e.g. Denis Ritchie,
| Simon Peyton-Jones...).
|
| What a Phd recognizes, and is relevant to the project at
| hand, is the ability "to produce original research that
| expands the boundaries of knowledge".
|
| (Per Wikipedia: "Because it is an earned research degree,
| those studying for a PhD are required to produce original
| research that expands the boundaries of knowledge,
| normally in the form of a thesis or dissertation, and
| defend their work against experts in the field. The
| completion of a PhD is often a requirement for employment
| as [...] a scientist in many fields.")
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > There are, specially in the field of computing science,
| examples of exceptionally gifted and influential
| researchers without PhDs
|
| If you know this, and know that people without one can
| still produce original research that expands the
| boundaries of knowledge (even giving your own examples)
| then why do you require one?
| fermigier wrote:
| As stated elsewhere, this helps establish the credibility
| of the selection process in the eyes of the French fiscal
| administration, which, ultimately, is the biggest funder
| of the FDL (through various tax incentives).
|
| Moreover, as it is a voluntary function, no one is harmed
| financially by this constraint.
| smetsjp wrote:
| Holders of a PhD are considered as "capable of assessing
| the state of the art" by Tax authorities. Having PhDs in
| the committee which decides of grants thus reduces to
| legal risk of later seing tax cuts being cancelled by Tax
| authorities.
|
| Regarding projects which receive a grant, holding a PhD
| does not matter.
| gntyo wrote:
| Simon Peyton Jones would not qualify (though he has an
| honorary doctorate now).
|
| In OSS scientific software, many PhDs have management jobs,
| where they write a couple of grand sounding fantasy roadmaps
| and have creative people who report to them. Printing money
| basically.
| jabl wrote:
| If you're in Academia for the money you're an imbecile.
| Which would sort of disqualify you for said academic work
| in the first place. Catch 22.
| abn1022 wrote:
| The jobs are not in academia.
| fermigier wrote:
| "Printing money" ? Really ? For the main European granting
| programme (Horizon Europe), the success rate is
| approximately 5%. In France, for funding schemes like ANR
| (Agence Nationale de la Recherche ~= the NSF in the US), it
| also between 5% and 10%. This means lead researchers need
| to put enormous time and effort into the grant application
| process, with extremely random results, even for the best
| cases.
|
| (As someone who has sat in various pre-selection committees
| over the last 15 years, i.e. without a final say on who
| gets funded and who doesn't, I can also add that sometimes
| the best applications don't get funded, and average or even
| mediocre ones get funded instead).
|
| And yes, in every organizations, being research or not, you
| will inevitably have people who end up in management and
| manage people who do most of the creative work. Does this
| mean that these managers are (or become) incompetent or
| useless ? I don't think so.
|
| (For background information on this specific topic, on can
| (re)read The Pratice of Management by Peter Drucker (1954)
| ( https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/48018.The_Practice
| _of... -> ""The manager is the dynamic, life-giving element
| in every business" who defines the organization's mission,
| develops and retains productive teams, coordinates various
| activities, sets goals, and gets things done.").
| tqazn wrote:
| "The manager is the dynamic, life-giving element in every
| business"
|
| At best this self-glorification applies to physical work
| like an Amazon distribution center, where one indeed
| needs direct people skills _of a certain kind_.
|
| It applies less to intellectual endeavors in general.
|
| It does not apply _at all_ to software development, where
| a plethora of successful projects proves the direct
| opposite. It happens, of course, that projects succeed
| _despite_ the manager, who still gets the credit.
|
| Fred Brooks' works apply to software, not Peter
| Drucker's.
| junon wrote:
| I don't see this requirement anywhere, can you point me to it?
| indymike wrote:
| Please, please fix the text justification on this site. It is
| unreadable on mobile.
| smetsjp wrote:
| I just checked on my mobile and it was OK. Can you send a
| screenshot to me (jp@smets.com) so that we can improve?
| indymike wrote:
| Email sent.
| thecodrr wrote:
| The process looks quite complicated and time consuming. I wonder
| how many FOSS projects will enroll. The criteria is alright but
| doesn't mention anything about library maintainers.
|
| In the end, it's money so I get why it has to be so long form and
| time consuming but I think a lot of really good projects will
| either not take the time to enroll or give up in the middle.
|
| In my opinion, such a fund should be set up for both big projects
| with orgs behind them and small projects with only a few people.
| Otherwise, it doesn't actually benefit or encourage anyone. Of
| course, the amount of funding could be relative to the size and
| impact but everyone should be encouraged to enroll. That way OSS
| can become a truly sustainable system.
| smetsjp wrote:
| The process mimics other grants which are known aa compliant
| with Tax Law. This is a way to increase juridical safety for
| donators.
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(page generated 2021-10-09 23:00 UTC)