"The approach we're taking here is basically the opposite of what you're advocating; I am not aware of any open source projects that email people asking them to

"The approach we're taking here is basically the opposite of what you're advocating; I am not aware of any open source projects that email people asking them to contribute." I'm not saying it common or anything haha. I'm just offering sending messages to people about a project that fits their expertise as a way to boost number of people that know about it and might contribute. This is with assumption that whatever qualified minorities candidates aren't seeing the opportunity or nobody has nudged them to act on it. If for other reasons, this might have no effect. Of course, one must balance against overdoing it or we get posts about "Rust zealots" blasting messages at everyone. Very selective based on talent with personalized messages with no commitment required. I've gotten a few people interested in experimenting with approaches to automated testing and coding in SPARK Ada just sending occasional emails or messages. Although, most come to me after I post in different places with different types of people/projects that might find them useful. Also, I speculate maybe on web forum side looking for forums with higher percentage of minority programmers or just experimenters/makers where you do your normal thing sharing interesting posts about Rust or its ecosystem. Just some extra brainstorming. I agree there's no silver bullet. It will require lots of experimentation, measurement, listening, and time above all.