As a major Open Source contributor, I'd say that advocating the software goes a long way. For example, in one of my last job (I'm a freelance), I could get pai

As a major Open Source contributor, I'd say that advocating the software goes a long way. For example, in one of my last job (I'm a freelance), I could get paid full time to contribute to open source tools because the guy taking the decision heard about PostgreSQL and open source somewhere. If that guy has only heard about Oracle, the same work would have gone closed source. If the person responsible for the office solution of a school heard of open office from you, you did help a lot. Because many times, big open source users will invest in open source, in form of support, custom development or just sponsoring.