On OSS projects, I think that we need to find a more robust model than what we have in most cases. To me, the most successful and efficient models when it come

On OSS projects, I think that we need to find a more robust model than what we have in most cases. To me, the most successful and efficient models when it comes to building open, capable, stable and friendly software (all those four) seems to be delegating all the work to a team of a few but very experienced developers. I'm thinking Blender, GIMP, Csound, Ardour, many video codecs, etc. It also seems all these projects have in common highly technical fields (3D, audio or video), which implies a far steeper learning curves than your average github project. Maybe we could even infer that one solution to drive contributions up is to make it less easy and less ostensibly accessible. I personally pay for Blender because I want them to improve some features. Plus I'm not sure if getting pull requests from random strangers all the time is a good way to take a software in the serious direction -- I'd wager reducing complexity by lowering the amount of people involved and the extensive need for communication is what keeps the core dev team focused, fast and flexible. Anyway, my 2 cents.