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The secret life of open source developers [video]

102 points by chippy 7y ago

wiz21c 7y ago
Hmmmm I dunno... You make software available to other people, for free. But it's for them to use it (else, what's the point ?). So you're exposing yourself to users and users behave like users. It's not because you give away something for free that its value (and the way that value is recognized, for example, by being polite) is any different. The only thing you get by making it is the right, as a creator, to make it the way you want. That's the freedom you get (and what a beautiful one). But it doesn't give you any power on those who'll use it (well, except for the license); in particular, you have no power to make the users polite. Now, of course, I prefer to talk with people who are polite and who express gratitude for the work I do for free. And of course I don't like rude people. But making FOSS doesn't change the human nature of you users. Even if you put hard work in it, you sacrifice a bit of your life... So, the overall tone of the presentation seems a bit off to me. I would have preferred something like : here's why we do it, what motivates us, the success, the failures,... But the user, well, they just are what they are, software can't fix that. (in case you wonder, yes, I've made some open source projects, one success, on failure and guess what, the success, at least to me, was measured by the number of users).
- pgeorgi 7y ago
  > But it's for them to use it (else, what's the point ?). The point is to have the software yourself. If it helps somebody else, all the better - but, like building a community, that's not necessarily the point.
  - notacoward 7y ago
    > The point is to have the software yourself. That's certainly not true enough of the time to make such a general statement, and I contend it's mostly untrue. A lot of developers create OSS that they can't really use themselves. For example, I'm a maintainer for an OSS scale-out filesystem. I have no personal use for such a thing. The company that originally created it had no internal use for it, and the company that acquired them actively resisted its use internally. A lot of OSS has management or monitoring components, or integrations with other software, that the developers themselves don't use. Having the software yourself can't be a motive in these cases. Believe it or not, most OSS is written because the developers expect to make money from it and/or because they believe it will make the world a better place - not because they themselves use it.
    - pgeorgi 7y ago
      Right, I should have phrased it better: it's about self-interest. That interest _can_ be use of the software for yourself, and you're right, it can be selling support for the software or in open core models, selling add-ons. I suppose "make the world a better place" can be a motivation as well (though I don't think it'll last very long for any individual unless they're RMS, maybe). There may be personal curiosity or education as motivation as well. I don't think percentages between the motivations even matter for what the presentation is about (because it certainly isn't about users that pay for service contracts). So there are transactional situations (support contract, other payments), there's "better world" idealism, and there's immediate self-interest ("I use this stuff myself"). Users being pushy on a communication medium demanding work from others with no fulfillment of these motivations that would back the demand doesn't even make the world a better place (pushy people != better world), so there's nothing in it for the devs. Which gets back to the point of the presentation: if you want something fixed, step in (do it yourself, pay somebody to do it for you, ...). You can ask nicely, and that might even work at times, but you're not entitled to anybody agreeing to that kind of one-sided transaction.
  - thrower123 7y ago
    That's probably the only really sustainable way to have open source without making it into somebody's job. Make what you want or need for yourself, and share it with other people. But be under no obligation to place their needs over your own.
- laumars 7y ago
  > So, the overall tone of the presentation seems a bit off to me. I can see why you might think that but I think everyone is entitled a platform to vent their frustrations on from time to time. They didn't come off rude and I think their comments are ones worth making. However I do agree it was very focused on their bad experiences with user/community interactions.
- notacoward 7y ago
  > it doesn't give you any power The mistake is thinking it's about power. It's about aligning goals. A lot of the individual motivation for OSS is about making the world (what the developer believes is) a better place. Things that contribute to that vision are welcome; things that distract from it are not. The first category includes detailed bug reports and feature requests consistent with the software's existing direction. The second includes vague bug reports and requests for features that the developers don't believe in. Try demanding that security software should include a back door and see what kind of reception that gets. The problem isn't that asking developers to do things for you is rude by itself. You can ask politely, they can decline politely, end of story. It's not even that pestering developers after such a refusal is rude, even though that's obviously the case. The problem is that such an approach isn't very effective. If you can convince the developers that fixing your problem is consistent with their own vision of how to make the project fulfill its existing goals, that's much more effective than mere badgering. If you want someone to do something for you, in any context, it's better to have them think of you as a collaborator than as someone who just makes demands.
  - ratmice 7y ago
    not sure it is about aligning goals, It seems more like maximizing collaboration in spite of diverging goals, and doing so without compromising upon them. If your goals, and their goals either conflict or do not intersect, either one or both compromise, or dont -- and can't... In theory neither holds any more power than the other. In practice and politics collaboration as a social activity is subject held beliefs by one or both parties which distort this aspect of equal power.
  - shashankp 7y ago
    Right, so once you start "aligning goals", the concept of power and power itself just snaps out of existence, and the contributor ceases to be a human being and transcends into a divine roadmap.
- mugsie 7y ago
  > in particular, you have no power to make the users polite. So very (and unfortunately) true. However they also have no power to make you do the thing they need straight away, or ever. > Even if you put hard work in it, you sacrifice a bit of your life. And this is bad. We need to move the needle away from this. It is incredibly exclusionary I am a younger person, no kids, in a job where I was able to negotiate for open source maintenance time. By making "sacrifice" a requirement it makes it off putting for someone with kids, or working in a job that has them working long hours, or working multiple jobs. > But the user, well, they just are what they are, software can't fix that. No, software can't fix it. but highlighting the problem, and letting people possibly see what they are doing is not useful may change the user. I have been a maintainer of a project for a long time, and I get everything from people pinging me in our IRC channel, to DMing me, to asking if I give them my skype ID so I can call into a bridge to help them debug an issue at midnight. We need to highlight this is not OK. Personally, I really like the PowerDNS rule for open source support [1] - it sets expectations, and the base requirements from someone looking for help. > the success, at least to me, was measured by the number of users That is a valid metric, but just one. I personally measured the success of the project based on what people were using it (e.g. I would rather wikimedia vs 20 startups), but that metric is really person specific. 1 - https://blog.powerdns.com/2016/01/18/open-source-support-out-in-the-open/ https://blog.powerdns.com/2016/01/18/open-source-support-out...
  - mikekchar 7y ago
    > By making "sacrifice" a requirement it makes it off putting for someone with kids, or working in a job that has them working long hours, or working multiple jobs. I think I understand what you are saying, but perhaps you are talking at cross purposes with the OP. I don't think anyone thinks that sacrifice is required from the perspective that you owe it to anyone to do anything in particular. But, as you know from maintaining a project, what you do is always a trade off. Even if you negotiate time for open source maintenance in your work, you may suffer in your career compared to the person who focuses only on climbing the ladder. In fact, I do not allow my work to pay for my free software work -- because freedom is the thing I want from that work. People who pay usually expect something in return and I seriously am not inclined to give it to them (especially since the demands are usually after the fact). There are many people who think you can have it all. If you spend hundreds of hours working on free software, working on not-free software, playing video games, watching reality shows, typing replies into HN, etc, etc, that time is spent. That's time you don't get to spend with your kids. Or your spouse. Or walking in the woods. It's important that people who choose to do these things actually choose, I think. It's all too easy to get to a certain age and realise, "Well, crap. That's not what I wanted to have done". So, yes, it's a sacrifice. You don't get to do it for free. Someone with kids, or working in a job that has long hours, or working multiple jobs often will not choose to spend hundreds of house writing free software. They have more important things to do, and that's totally OK.
tonyjstark 7y ago
I once got a mail for a free software I published: "You're product sucks, I don't like it, why are you even doing this? There are much better alternatives out there.". So what to do with that? I have to admit that this mail really stung for a while. Maybe I should have asked, why it sucked for this person, but then, why should I care about someone rude? It didn't take me long to learn that some percentage of people tend to behave badly, especially on the internet and I can't do anything about it. I don't even exclude myself, I also wrote things to support addresses that I regret now. Overall, when I release something in the open now I do it because either I don't care, it's good for my image or I hope that people like it. I ignore rude comments and enjoy the happy ones. You would hope that people that know about OSS would be more considerate but they just aren't, free-loaders exist everywhere, it's a human problem, but it's also no reason to not stay idealistic. EDIT: typo
- userbinator 7y ago
  My usual response is "Then go use those alternatives instead of bothering me. It works fine for me." The majority of the things I "throw out there", I know perfectly well will not be useful to a significant number of users, and that's fine. I just do it because it costs very little, and someone might find it useful. (In case you were wondering, I'm not going to show the stuff I've put out here for a variety of reasons, sorry.)
- mugsie 7y ago
  Those sort of emails are really hard to deal with, especially when it is something you spent a lot of time working on. I like the idea from the talk of just blocking them outright.
  - megous 7y ago
    I learened not to engage. It only ever once turned out, that the user actually spent quite a bit of time and contributed something as a result of me engaging futher and not just ignoring the e-mail. I guess some people may just be grumpy for whatever reason, and it will bubble up in the conversation. But I don't usually care for the positive words that much either. I guess it's nice that my sw is helping someone, and whatnot, and great, but it's usually just a preface to some request or issue someone's having, often times solvable by reading the man page, or using --help, or checking if there's a newer version and trying that before bothering the authors. The only people that stand out are those that just send a thank you without anything else. Quite rare. What'd probably be more interesting to receive is just a thank you note and some info about what the user is using the sw for. That might as well be inspirational, at the very least, and perhaps an opener for some collaboration. I think I received such a message 2-3x in the last 15 years. Very rare! Maybe people need a bit of probing in the README to send such messages. :D
jchw 7y ago
There are many reasons why I use open source, but far and away one of the biggest reasons is simply the power it gives you as a user. I know it’s a cliche but if there's a problem you want fixed, you really can go and fix it, and everyone else benefits. Once you have a full community, this becomes extremely powerful. The thing is, though, I really only work on things in a more selfish manner. For example, I’ve been contributing a bit to a very cool project called Kaitai Struct. But as cool as it is, I’m contributing for myself, on things I personally care about. If you work at a company and you are bickering with open source maintainers, you’re really missing the point of open source. If it’s costing you money, then it was making you money. Give a tiny bit of effort back, and you benefit yourself and incidentally everyone else too. It’s a win-win, and you won’t get blocked on Twitter. If you/your company genuinely can’t spare the expense of spending a few engineer hours a week on FOSS, but also can’t afford to buy support contracts or pay for commercial software, that really seems like a problem, doesn’t it? Disclaimer: I probably do not do enough open source work to really speak with authority. If you want to judge for yourself, I am jchv on Github.
neves 7y ago
I'm curious: where the "secret life of" comes from? The earlier example that I could find was "the secret life of plants" a Stevie Wonder music.
- pramsey 7y ago
  I'd guess "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty", which is actually about his daydreams, his internal secret life, not some real world life behind closed doors.
- Jur 7y ago
  My guess is it's meant as a hint at the misunderstanding from OSS-users with how open source developers benefit and contribute, which is unlike a commercial product or company
lsofzz 7y ago
Definitely a good refresher video. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that its important to re-visit what we take for granted every single day and at the least be appreciative of all the amazing value open source software community brings.

102 points by chippy 7y ago

Hmmmm I dunno... You make software available to other people, for free. But it's for them to use it (else, what's the point ?). So you're exposing yourself to users and users behave like users. It's not because you give away something for free that its value (and the way that value is recognized, for example, by being polite) is any different. The only thing you get by making it is the right, as a creator, to make it the way you want. That's the freedom you get (and what a beautiful one). But it doesn't give you any power on those who'll use it (well, except for the license); in particular, you have no power to make the users polite. Now, of course, I prefer to talk with people who are polite and who express gratitude for the work I do for free. And of course I don't like rude people. But making FOSS doesn't change the human nature of you users. Even if you put hard work in it, you sacrifice a bit of your life... So, the overall tone of the presentation seems a bit off to me. I would have preferred something like : here's why we do it, what motivates us, the success, the failures,... But the user, well, they just are what they are, software can't fix that. (in case you wonder, yes, I've made some open source projects, one success, on failure and guess what, the success, at least to me, was measured by the number of users).

pgeorgi 7y ago
> But it's for them to use it (else, what's the point ?). The point is to have the software yourself. If it helps somebody else, all the better - but, like building a community, that's not necessarily the point.
- notacoward 7y ago
  > The point is to have the software yourself. That's certainly not true enough of the time to make such a general statement, and I contend it's mostly untrue. A lot of developers create OSS that they can't really use themselves. For example, I'm a maintainer for an OSS scale-out filesystem. I have no personal use for such a thing. The company that originally created it had no internal use for it, and the company that acquired them actively resisted its use internally. A lot of OSS has management or monitoring components, or integrations with other software, that the developers themselves don't use. Having the software yourself can't be a motive in these cases. Believe it or not, most OSS is written because the developers expect to make money from it and/or because they believe it will make the world a better place - not because they themselves use it.
  - pgeorgi 7y ago
    Right, I should have phrased it better: it's about self-interest. That interest _can_ be use of the software for yourself, and you're right, it can be selling support for the software or in open core models, selling add-ons. I suppose "make the world a better place" can be a motivation as well (though I don't think it'll last very long for any individual unless they're RMS, maybe). There may be personal curiosity or education as motivation as well. I don't think percentages between the motivations even matter for what the presentation is about (because it certainly isn't about users that pay for service contracts). So there are transactional situations (support contract, other payments), there's "better world" idealism, and there's immediate self-interest ("I use this stuff myself"). Users being pushy on a communication medium demanding work from others with no fulfillment of these motivations that would back the demand doesn't even make the world a better place (pushy people != better world), so there's nothing in it for the devs. Which gets back to the point of the presentation: if you want something fixed, step in (do it yourself, pay somebody to do it for you, ...). You can ask nicely, and that might even work at times, but you're not entitled to anybody agreeing to that kind of one-sided transaction.
- thrower123 7y ago
  That's probably the only really sustainable way to have open source without making it into somebody's job. Make what you want or need for yourself, and share it with other people. But be under no obligation to place their needs over your own.
laumars 7y ago
> So, the overall tone of the presentation seems a bit off to me. I can see why you might think that but I think everyone is entitled a platform to vent their frustrations on from time to time. They didn't come off rude and I think their comments are ones worth making. However I do agree it was very focused on their bad experiences with user/community interactions.
notacoward 7y ago
> it doesn't give you any power The mistake is thinking it's about power. It's about aligning goals. A lot of the individual motivation for OSS is about making the world (what the developer believes is) a better place. Things that contribute to that vision are welcome; things that distract from it are not. The first category includes detailed bug reports and feature requests consistent with the software's existing direction. The second includes vague bug reports and requests for features that the developers don't believe in. Try demanding that security software should include a back door and see what kind of reception that gets. The problem isn't that asking developers to do things for you is rude by itself. You can ask politely, they can decline politely, end of story. It's not even that pestering developers after such a refusal is rude, even though that's obviously the case. The problem is that such an approach isn't very effective. If you can convince the developers that fixing your problem is consistent with their own vision of how to make the project fulfill its existing goals, that's much more effective than mere badgering. If you want someone to do something for you, in any context, it's better to have them think of you as a collaborator than as someone who just makes demands.
- ratmice 7y ago
  not sure it is about aligning goals, It seems more like maximizing collaboration in spite of diverging goals, and doing so without compromising upon them. If your goals, and their goals either conflict or do not intersect, either one or both compromise, or dont -- and can't... In theory neither holds any more power than the other. In practice and politics collaboration as a social activity is subject held beliefs by one or both parties which distort this aspect of equal power.
- shashankp 7y ago
  Right, so once you start "aligning goals", the concept of power and power itself just snaps out of existence, and the contributor ceases to be a human being and transcends into a divine roadmap.
mugsie 7y ago
> in particular, you have no power to make the users polite. So very (and unfortunately) true. However they also have no power to make you do the thing they need straight away, or ever. > Even if you put hard work in it, you sacrifice a bit of your life. And this is bad. We need to move the needle away from this. It is incredibly exclusionary I am a younger person, no kids, in a job where I was able to negotiate for open source maintenance time. By making "sacrifice" a requirement it makes it off putting for someone with kids, or working in a job that has them working long hours, or working multiple jobs. > But the user, well, they just are what they are, software can't fix that. No, software can't fix it. but highlighting the problem, and letting people possibly see what they are doing is not useful may change the user. I have been a maintainer of a project for a long time, and I get everything from people pinging me in our IRC channel, to DMing me, to asking if I give them my skype ID so I can call into a bridge to help them debug an issue at midnight. We need to highlight this is not OK. Personally, I really like the PowerDNS rule for open source support [1] - it sets expectations, and the base requirements from someone looking for help. > the success, at least to me, was measured by the number of users That is a valid metric, but just one. I personally measured the success of the project based on what people were using it (e.g. I would rather wikimedia vs 20 startups), but that metric is really person specific. 1 - https://blog.powerdns.com/2016/01/18/open-source-support-out-in-the-open/ https://blog.powerdns.com/2016/01/18/open-source-support-out...
- mikekchar 7y ago
  > By making "sacrifice" a requirement it makes it off putting for someone with kids, or working in a job that has them working long hours, or working multiple jobs. I think I understand what you are saying, but perhaps you are talking at cross purposes with the OP. I don't think anyone thinks that sacrifice is required from the perspective that you owe it to anyone to do anything in particular. But, as you know from maintaining a project, what you do is always a trade off. Even if you negotiate time for open source maintenance in your work, you may suffer in your career compared to the person who focuses only on climbing the ladder. In fact, I do not allow my work to pay for my free software work -- because freedom is the thing I want from that work. People who pay usually expect something in return and I seriously am not inclined to give it to them (especially since the demands are usually after the fact). There are many people who think you can have it all. If you spend hundreds of hours working on free software, working on not-free software, playing video games, watching reality shows, typing replies into HN, etc, etc, that time is spent. That's time you don't get to spend with your kids. Or your spouse. Or walking in the woods. It's important that people who choose to do these things actually choose, I think. It's all too easy to get to a certain age and realise, "Well, crap. That's not what I wanted to have done". So, yes, it's a sacrifice. You don't get to do it for free. Someone with kids, or working in a job that has long hours, or working multiple jobs often will not choose to spend hundreds of house writing free software. They have more important things to do, and that's totally OK.

tonyjstark 7y ago

I once got a mail for a free software I published: "You're product sucks, I don't like it, why are you even doing this? There are much better alternatives out there.". So what to do with that? I have to admit that this mail really stung for a while. Maybe I should have asked, why it sucked for this person, but then, why should I care about someone rude? It didn't take me long to learn that some percentage of people tend to behave badly, especially on the internet and I can't do anything about it. I don't even exclude myself, I also wrote things to support addresses that I regret now. Overall, when I release something in the open now I do it because either I don't care, it's good for my image or I hope that people like it. I ignore rude comments and enjoy the happy ones. You would hope that people that know about OSS would be more considerate but they just aren't, free-loaders exist everywhere, it's a human problem, but it's also no reason to not stay idealistic. EDIT: typo

userbinator 7y ago
My usual response is "Then go use those alternatives instead of bothering me. It works fine for me." The majority of the things I "throw out there", I know perfectly well will not be useful to a significant number of users, and that's fine. I just do it because it costs very little, and someone might find it useful. (In case you were wondering, I'm not going to show the stuff I've put out here for a variety of reasons, sorry.)
mugsie 7y ago
Those sort of emails are really hard to deal with, especially when it is something you spent a lot of time working on. I like the idea from the talk of just blocking them outright.
- megous 7y ago
  I learened not to engage. It only ever once turned out, that the user actually spent quite a bit of time and contributed something as a result of me engaging futher and not just ignoring the e-mail. I guess some people may just be grumpy for whatever reason, and it will bubble up in the conversation. But I don't usually care for the positive words that much either. I guess it's nice that my sw is helping someone, and whatnot, and great, but it's usually just a preface to some request or issue someone's having, often times solvable by reading the man page, or using --help, or checking if there's a newer version and trying that before bothering the authors. The only people that stand out are those that just send a thank you without anything else. Quite rare. What'd probably be more interesting to receive is just a thank you note and some info about what the user is using the sw for. That might as well be inspirational, at the very least, and perhaps an opener for some collaboration. I think I received such a message 2-3x in the last 15 years. Very rare! Maybe people need a bit of probing in the README to send such messages. :D

jchw 7y ago

There are many reasons why I use open source, but far and away one of the biggest reasons is simply the power it gives you as a user. I know it’s a cliche but if there's a problem you want fixed, you really can go and fix it, and everyone else benefits. Once you have a full community, this becomes extremely powerful. The thing is, though, I really only work on things in a more selfish manner. For example, I’ve been contributing a bit to a very cool project called Kaitai Struct. But as cool as it is, I’m contributing for myself, on things I personally care about. If you work at a company and you are bickering with open source maintainers, you’re really missing the point of open source. If it’s costing you money, then it was making you money. Give a tiny bit of effort back, and you benefit yourself and incidentally everyone else too. It’s a win-win, and you won’t get blocked on Twitter. If you/your company genuinely can’t spare the expense of spending a few engineer hours a week on FOSS, but also can’t afford to buy support contracts or pay for commercial software, that really seems like a problem, doesn’t it? Disclaimer: I probably do not do enough open source work to really speak with authority. If you want to judge for yourself, I am jchv on Github.

neves 7y ago

I'm curious: where the "secret life of" comes from? The earlier example that I could find was "the secret life of plants" a Stevie Wonder music.

pramsey 7y ago
I'd guess "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty", which is actually about his daydreams, his internal secret life, not some real world life behind closed doors.
Jur 7y ago
My guess is it's meant as a hint at the misunderstanding from OSS-users with how open source developers benefit and contribute, which is unlike a commercial product or company

lsofzz 7y ago

Definitely a good refresher video. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that its important to re-visit what we take for granted every single day and at the least be appreciative of all the amazing value open source software community brings.