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OK and quite right, but how do we actually ensure funding for the stuff that needs it? It seems odd to me that people won't cough up even small amounts to supp
by tempguy9999 7y ago
OK and quite right, but how do we actually ensure funding for the stuff that needs it?
It seems odd to me that people won't cough up even small amounts to support what F/OSS they rely on, but will pay for closed source stuff.
- Hamuko 7y agoHow many people actually rely on standard? I'm not talking about downloads, I'm talking about active users.
- tempguy9999 7y agoI am being thick; what's the relevance of that?
- Hamuko 7y agoWell, if we are talking about funding FOSS projects that people rely on, we should first establish what projects people rely on. When installing a package is so easy that you do it a hundred times without even knowing it, the download numbers don't really convey that information. It's more of an indicator of dependency penetration.
- lacker 7y agoCompanies will often pay small amounts for needed support. It’s pretty common to just hire an external contractor to make some improvements to an open source project that you need. I know a number of people who have gotten open source work funded in this way. What companies are reluctant to do is pay people money for nothing in return. There are just too many different open source libraries that you use in the normal course of development to communicate with all the developers, much less pay them.
- _frkl 7y agoMy feeling is mainly because they don't need to for F/OSS, but need to for closed source software. I don't even think it's the money in a lot of cases, just the administrative effort around it. Could be wrong though.