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Germany offers up to €30k for 6 months of working on OSS
- bflesch 10y agoSite is down unfortunately. Haven't read about this topic anywhere else yet so I am a bit sceptical.
- buro9 10y agohttps://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:prototypefund.de/%3Flang%3Den&num=1&strip=1&vwsrc=0 https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:protot... Although the FAQ with any info is not in the Google cache, so it's still less than useful.
- bflesch 10y agoOkay thanks. There is also a German-language news article here: https://netzpolitik.org/2016/12-millionen-euro-fuer-open-source-neuer-prototype-fund-foerdert-gemeinnuetzige-projekte/ https://netzpolitik.org/2016/12-millionen-euro-fuer-open-sou... They give you up to 30k for 6 months, and it is funded by the German ministry of education. Their strive for a very easy application process where you just need to write an email and send a link of your open source project, and a list of goals you want to achieve with the money. So it passes the smell test and seems like a great opportunity for European oss devs. I couldn't find any info which explicitly states that projects outside the EU might be funded.
- qznc 10y ago"Self-employed and independent developers who live in Germany can apply for funding."
- bflesch 10y agoThanks :) This should include European citizens who live in Germany.
- sveme 10y agoIt's not limited to EU citizens, anyone with the right to work and live in Germany can apply.
- denzil_correa 10y agoThe application seems to be only in German though. http://prototypefund.de/submission/ http://prototypefund.de/submission/
- erlehmann_ 10y agoThe FAQ is in the Wayback Machine: http://web.archive.org/web/20160801094432/http://prototypefund.de/faq/?lang=en http://web.archive.org/web/20160801094432/http://prototypefu... I had to disable CSS to see the answers, though.
- alvarosm 10y agoOne of the virtues of OSS :)
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- mtmail 10y agoEnglish translation of the announcement https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=de&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fcodefor.de%2Fblog%2Fprototype-fund https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=de&sl=auto&tl=en&u...
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- J_Darnley 10y ago> With a grant of up to €30,000, software developers [...] can write code and develop open source prototypes over a period of six months. > You have 6 months to implement your idea from the first concept to a prototype. Oh, it wants to fund new stuff and not fund a Firefox, Gimp, Linux kernel, whatever dev to work for 6 months.
- Arnt 10y agoIt wants new stuff, but that doesn't mean "from scratch" or "not firefox". Plain bugfixing is out, new features may be in. You have to write a paragraph or two about how New Feature X is in line with their goals, one of which is more intelligent/better informed use of people's personal data. It doesn't seem impossible to do something along those lines with firefox.
- tckr 10y agoThe FAQ says you can also work on existing projects, given that you can clearly define a project for the funds.
- flapperleenie 10y agoAny new module for an existing project is eligible as well. It's in the FAQs.
- progx 10y agoHope a new module, that replace an old module (with less functionality) is accepted too.
- felipeerias 10y agoGimp is a more traditional Free SW project, but most developers on Firefox and the Linux kernel are already being perfectly funded by the corporations that employ them.
- DanSmooth 10y agoAdditional details: https://okfn.de/en/projekte/prototypefund/ https://okfn.de/en/projekte/prototypefund/ It has support from the BMBF (Federal Ministry for Education and Research)
- pudo 10y agoBasically, the project team for this (which is a German non-profit) wants to make the case that public funding of F/OSS can spawn cool tech that might eventually turn into startups. The idea is to create a buffer between government (grant) bureaucracy and individual developers so that they have the least possible amount of forms and applications to deal with -- just fill out a few basic questions, and a panel of pretty cool judges gets to make the grants. German residents only, for the moment.
- matt4077 10y agoThat "buffer" model is more or less the default for public R&D funding in Germany as well as the EU. It allows for a bit of innovation in the grant process (although they're often administered by agencies that are every bit as beaurocratic as you'd expect them to be)
- josephg 10y agoCan non-german residents apply if we're willing & able to move to Germany for 6 months?
- pudo 10y agoDon't see why not if you're in a country that's planning to stay in the EU and you're crazy enough. For non-EU, no idea what the freelance situation looks like :/
- wolfgke 10y agoAs far as I understand it, you already have to live in Germany when you apply (so that you don't move to Germany only when your application was successful). To quote from http://prototypefund.de/en/submission/ http://prototypefund.de/en/submission/: "Ich bin über 18 Jahre alt und mit meinem Hauptwohnsitz in Deutschland gemeldet." (roughly "I'm over 18 years old and have my primary residence in Germany"), which you have to sign. Additionally you have to fill out your application on http://prototypefund.de/en/submission/ http://prototypefund.de/en/submission/ in German. So if your knowledge of the German language is not good enough for that, you are probably out of luck. So it seems to me that if you are only willing to relocate to Germany when your application is successful or if your level of the German language is not sufficient to apply, the answer is "no". On the other hand: If you aren't a German citizen, this should be no problem.
- throw129112 10y agoHere is a project list: https://okfn.de/en/projekte/ https://okfn.de/en/projekte/ Looks like you can implement citizen/government related websites for a very low salary. Using the term OSS seems like a stretch.
- pudo 10y agoHow is it a "stretch" if we make open licensing a contractual requirement? For what it's worth: most of the software projects on that page have been developed by people on their own time, just because it's cool :)
- 01983091091 10y agoI don't see the point of funding the ONE area in software development where you can still make money, namely web companies. OSS for me is associated with thankless things like xterm, non-prestigious kernel drivers, Python modules etc. Are you going to fund such things? Really, to be more clear: If websites are also socialized, soon no one will be able to earn an income from programming at all.
- pudo 10y agoWhere does it say this is about websites? Or that it is against building (web) companies ? (Quite the opposite, actually!) I neither buy your point that 1.2mn R&D money will replace the dot-com economy with socialism, nor that there's no money in infra. Also, how come you think every place on the web should be for-profit? It's a bit like saying every city needs to turn all its parks and community centers into shopping malls so as not to undermine Starbucks right for revenue.
- 02190191 10y agoThe whole setup of this foundation is very website centric. The description of the candidates for funding is Internet centric. The emphasis is on "new projects". I can already tell you how it will go: People who are good at grant writing, have no shame in over-promising and throw around the right buzzwords will get the "R&D" money. After 6 months you'll have half-finished, bug ridden implementations that are bad copies of existing software, and the projects will be abandoned.
- viach 10y agoThis OSS initiative is open only for "Self-employed and independent developers who live in Germany". So that there is no love for the open source projects people do after their daily work in Iowa?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- cm3 10y agoI feel like there ought to be a way to publicly fund FOSS developers full-time because they often produce software used by everybody and therefore a product for the common good, just like someone working at an NGO. You may laugh and say it's a stretch to compare it to working with disadvantaged people or similar work, but software is used everywhere and we rely it on it in all kinds of situations now. So, why shouldn't there be a FOSS org that collects donations to compensate maintainers of projects? Right now, this exists as fundraisers on a project basis and therefore only a couple high profile projects manage to a few of their developers to focus on it more than just on weekends. One might argue this should be supported at least financially or with a do-not-starve stipend by the government, but this may again be controversial. The government could start by making taxation easier for people who could get donations or many small one-time payments aka nano-contracting (prioritized bug fix for pay). In most countries the tax code is not on the side of a hobby programmer who would accept many small payments but isn't already a freelancer.
- gaius 10y agoSo, why shouldn't there be a FOSS org that collects donations to compensate maintainers of projects? GNU does this I believe...
- raverbashing 10y agoHow effective are them at this? Which high importance projects have they financed? Legitimate questions, I'm not implying anything here
- gaius 10y agoGCC and Emacs spring to mind :-)
- cm3 10y agoI'm unaware of any Emacs or GCC dev being paid by the FSF. From what I recall, the Emacs maintainers do it as a hobby, and the GCC maintainers are employed by the likes of Red Hat to work on it. However, if what you're implying is true, I'd be more than happy to be proven wrong :).
- erlehmann_ 10y agoBlog post with rationale (German): http://codefor.de/blog/prototype-fund http://codefor.de/blog/prototype-fund
- sytse 10y agoIf you're interested in working on open source permanently consider applying at our open core company GitLab Inc. 80% of what we do is released as open source. Vacancies are at https://about.gitlab.com/jobs/ https://about.gitlab.com/jobs/ and we hire everywhere https://about.gitlab.com/team/ https://about.gitlab.com/team/
- cocotino 10y agoI hope you get more employees and/or funding, because 15 seconds for an "Already up-to-date." git pull is the norm with your service.
- sytse 10y agoYou're right, GitLab.com ssh access is way too slow. See https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/infrastructure/issues/59#note_13486751 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/infrastructure/issues/59#note_... for my writeup. We'll prioritize this.
- cocotino 10y agoThank you very much, it's appreciated.
- sytse 10y agoYou're welcome, thanks for commenting back. Also, we added public monitoring to measure this http://monitor.gitlab.net/dashboard/db/gitlab-status?panelId=12&fullscreen http://monitor.gitlab.net/dashboard/db/gitlab-status?panelId... Relevant part from our initial look into this https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/infrastructure/issues/59#note_13488035 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/infrastructure/issues/59#note_... "My gut feeling with all this is that the NFS server is the main bottleneck. It is maxing out all the time in CPU time dedicated to IO (check graph) and our last finding is also pointing in the direction that the way the LVM is setup (using linear) is not efficient at all, and it is generating a lot of overhead by fragmenting the actual filesystem for reads (on rewrites) and by concentrating all the writes into one single drive at time. The first test I want to make is to create the new NFS server, and add monitoring on that one to rule out completely the fact that the NFS server is the main bottleneck, hopefully this should happen today."
- vavoida 10y agotalking about funding 100.000 Euro funding available (total €5.5 million) for opendata startups & SMEs https://opendataincubator.eu/apply https://opendataincubator.eu/apply deadline by 30.08.2016
- tckr 10y agoIt's back online.
- k__ 10y agoCool. I'm a self employed dev from Germany and got free time the next months. But I got no idea for a project, haha.
- dkopi 10y agoDon't create a new project. Help maintain an existing one.
- k__ 10y agoAh, that is allowed too? Any OSS project leads here, that need a front-end developer? ;) Also: "Can I apply with a project that already exists? Yes you can. However, your proposal ought to be clearly defined and and have its own degree of novelty, e.g. you plan to expand or enhance your preexisting project with a new module. In any case, you need to make clear what you will be working on during the 6-month project term."
- marknadal 10y agoUp for helping us with [1]data sync (Open Source Firebase)? We're funded already but always need coding help. Latest stuff we've been working on is [2]performance (30M+ ops/sec)! [1] https://github.com/amark/gun https://github.com/amark/gun [2] https://github.com/amark/gun/wiki/100000-ops-sec-in-IE6-on-2GB-Atom-CPU https://github.com/amark/gun/wiki/100000-ops-sec-in-IE6-on-2...
- k__ 10y agoSounds nice :) Do you have any front-end projects that are "clearly defined and have its own degree of novelty"?
- marknadal 10y agoThey love vague statements, haha! I don't know if these qualify but things like (from most novel to least): WebRTC adapters, browser encryption/cryptography integration, SQL parser, React/Angular/Ember bindings, reference implementations/example apps. If you are curious and want to meet everybody else, shoot me an email! We'd love to hear your story. mark ATSIGN gunDB PERIOD io
- tobilg 10y agoAny hints why this is only for self-employed people? I think there are lots of OSS developers with very interesting/largely used projects which do this besides their normal job...
- k__ 10y agoProbably easier? I don't know. I mean, if you want to do this besides your day-job, you have to be self-employed too, otherwise how would you write bills?
- tobilg 10y agoYou're correct on this I guess. I was more wondering about the wording, because to me it sounds like full-time people with part-time "self-employment" are excluded.
- flapperleenie 10y agoUnder German law you can have part-time self-employed work alongside your normal job.
- k__ 10y agoAnd in fact, many people have. They need to give you the money somehow, if they don't want to employ you, that is (as far as I know) the only way.
- tobilg 10y agoYou're right! But then I'd really wish they'd refine the phrasing of the rule section. In fact, if you have a full-time employer, this employer will in most work contracts reserve the "right" to your full work capacity, and will insist on a sign-off for other jobs besides the "full-time" one.
- k__ 10y agoSure, but the project you want to get fundet doesn't need to be full-time. I know a bunch of people in full-time employment, who are self-employed on the side for few hours a week. Also, some employers would let you reduce to 80% or 50% for a few months, if they're nice :)
- NKCSS 10y agoWho can apply? Self-employed and independent developers who live in Germany can apply for funding. Support: Each project is backed with a maximum of 30,000€, coaching from experienced mentors, and collaboration with an exciting network. Time frame: You have 6 months to implement your idea from the first concept to a prototype. There will be four rounds of funding between 2016 and 2019. About 10 projects can be funded each round. Open Source: Your results must be made publicly available under an open source license.
- samoa4 10y agothey ought to clean their own house: not hosted in germany? it's for germans only could not afford a fresh ip for this project? wired combination of www- and plain domains in ssl-cert mixed ssl and plaintext css-animation drives (my) firefox to a grinding halt
- timwaagh 10y agothat's very nice for german developers. 30k for six months is not too bad for anyone but the most senior developers and you get to work on your own thing. I don't think comparing this with typical freelancing rates is completely fair because you are assured of work for six months.
- k__ 10y agoYes, I work at such rates often, if the contract are that long.
- Mithaldu 10y agoAs a german freelancer and long-time software dev with hundreds of releases of tens of apps/libraries, open source, under my belt, i can only say: This project is misguided. They want only "new" stuff. You may come in with something that already exists, but even then you need to prove how you're creating a "new" feature on top of that. However funding that is pointless. People do that ALL the time. I have tons of such prototypes i have made myself, over the years and i know thousands of those among OSS dev friends. They are typically works of passion and happen regardless of any other circumstances. Meanwhile the real problem is maintenance of existing software to combat bit rot. It usually requires experienced people who need to separate time from their already full schedules, but is largely ignored. See PGP.
- k__ 10y agoIt's not pointless, just different. I mean, yes people build prototypes all the time, but I think most of them don't put in 6 months full-time for a prototype.
- tomchristie 10y agoI think that's a rather negative outlook. Is the fund applicable to financing ongoing triage for projects? Nope. Is €30k worth of funding for 40 kicking off individual projects valuable and worthwhile? Hell, yes. Might the scope of an endeavor like this evolve in coming years, as they demonstrate success? Sure. Government backed funding for OSS projects is a really smart and efficient use of public money when it comes to investing in digital infrastructure. It doesn't need to be perfect on launch, and it's far easier to pitch and justify the value of seed money like this, than it is to make (just as valuable, but more subtle) wider case for ongoing funding. Furthermore I'm sure there's plenty of projects that could pitch proposals for new features that they want to build, while building in the cost of ongoing triage during those 6 months. (Ie. Make sure that the amount of work your proposing is viable on the assumption that you'll also have ongoing triage work to keep on top of at the same time.) Let's celebrate the OSS funding achievements as they come, rather than knocking them.
- Mithaldu 10y ago
- andrewvijay 10y agoThat homepage animation is eating up the damn frames and flickers the page in mobile. Maybe the first job in the contract should be to remove the heavy animations.;)
- mtrn 10y agoI would like to see more such models in the future, because two world seem to intersect here: open source projects and the public domain. Open source projects can have such a huge leverage, that the cost reductions in comparison to commercial offerings could be enormous. On the other hand, open source projects will gather people, who at least care about the specific domain (this does not mean, there is no politics). Treating software as public infrastructure could be a huge step forward.
- techno_modus 10y agoIt is a good opportunity but I could not find answers for these questions: - Is it permitted to use these 30k to pay for hosting/cloud or they do not limit the use of the grant? - Is a person eligible if he is employed but works also on some other projects (startup, open source). - Do they fund teams? For example, can two persons apply for the grant? For example, one person is employed and works part-time while the other developer works full-time.
- Quanttek 10y agoYour questions are partially answered in the FAQ: - From the german FAQ (the english is missing a sentence there): "What does the funding consist of? Each project will be funded for 6 months at most, and with a maximum amount of 30,000 €. Your work time on the project will be primarily funded. The amount of funding always equates to 60% of the overall project budget. The remaining 40% is your own contribution – meaning the time that you spend on pursuing the project." Though the "mainly" implies work time is not exclusively funded. You should probably contact them here: info@prototypefund.de - You need to be self-employed, but you don't need to work exclusively on your prototype: "The grant will be paid in instalments based on the work carried out at the beginning of each new quarter. Example: The eligibility period starts on 01.03.2017, therefore you can call for funds at the beginning of the new quarter (in this case, in April) proportionately to the work you performed." - "I am working on my project as part of a team, is there anything I should be aware of? As a rule, only individuals are eligible for funding. Whether several persons can apply for one project, or whether parts of the grant can be transferred, will be decided in each particular case, e.g. if there if there are distinct modules in the same project." http://prototypefund.de/en/faq/ http://prototypefund.de/en/faq/
- nxzero 10y agoWhile this is truly awesome — imagine how much more this would get done if it was not based on the developers being in Germany.
- kriro 10y agoIt sounds like a good idea in a vacuum. However I'm a bit worried that this might be in direct violation of some studies from psychology that basically say "as soon as you get money for something you do as a passion project you will stop doing it once the money stream ceases". Can't find the paper right now but the famous one involved kids painting things iirc. I feel like there needs to be a very good integration plan for the time once the funding ends (which I think is lacking).
- Toboe 10y agoNot the paper, but a wikipedia article on the effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overjustification_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overjustification_effect
- tormeh 10y agoI hope someone applies to work on Redox. It's just so cool.
- asavinov 10y agoFor comparison, the EXIST Business Start-up Grant from BMWI (Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy) provides 2500 EUR/month = 30k€/year. http://www.exist.de/EN/Programme/EXIST-Business-Startup-Grant/content.html http://www.exist.de/EN/Programme/EXIST-Business-Startup-Gran... So PrototypeFund (BMBF) pays twice as much for open source project development as EXIST for founding a startup. Yet, startups in EXIST get also something for equipment, marketing, coaching etc. Also, they probably will be taxed differently.
- g8oz 10y agoGermany is so far ahead in their understanding of the common good. Recall too that they single-handedly jump started the modern solar industry with their feed-in tariff scheme.
- erlehmann_ 10y agohttps://prototypefund.de/?lang=en https://prototypefund.de/?lang=en does not work for me. https://prototypefund.de/ https://prototypefund.de/ does work for me.