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> This lack of diversity is unacceptable. Open source contributors self-select. They have to put time in, usually for $0 and often without thanks. I don't kn

> This lack of diversity is unacceptable. Open source contributors self-select. They have to put time in, usually for $0 and often without thanks. I don't know of any FOSS project who asks, or cares, about race or sex or anything else except code, or if the project is ill-maintained, at least your patch will get just as ignored regardless of your background. The article reads like some (white) Karen who wants to talk to FOSS' manager, there isn't any. If you think there should be more people sending patches or running FOSS projects, bring them, if their contributions are any good non-broken projects will be glad for them.

normdeplume2 5y ago
I'm not sure if you read the article, but literally every one of your points is clearly addressed Open source contributors self-select. > Yes, and if the environment is hostile to people of colour, or specific genders, they obviously won't contribute. They have to put time in, usually for $0 and often without thanks > Right. As the author states in a comment below the piece: "Open source work should be paid work, and, until it is, it shouldn't be a requirement to getting a job -- that only increases inequity when so much of the unpaid care work falls on those already minoritized by tech and open source." I don't know of any FOSS project who asks, or cares, about race or sex or anything else except code, or if the project is ill-maintained, at least your patch will get just as ignored regardless of your background. > So how do you explain all the research that tells you this isn't true? Such as this piece - https://peerj.com/preprints/1733/ https://peerj.com/preprints/1733/ - cited in the article.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  The data of the study doesn't reflect these conclusions to be honest. The most simple one, that women engage in far fewer numbers explains all observable effects in my opinion. Also the users the data observes are found on Github and Google+. This is a insufficient data if you write about the open source community in general. The implicit bias test the authors used to certify themselves have problems justifying their relevance.
  - chhum 5y ago
    "The most simple one, that women engage in far fewer numbers explains all observable effects in my opinion." > Well yes. But why do you think that is? If OSS is, in general, hostile to woman (and I would suggest that it is) than obviously fewer of them engage with it. Of course that same problem is reflected all the way up the chain - fewer woman become programmers because computing is hostile to them - a trend which starts at school and has been the case since about the 1980s.
- fivelessminutes 5y ago
  > I'm not sure if you read the article > As the author states in a comment Ie, not in the article. Can you elaborate on how that paper 'tells me' my own lived experience the last 20 years maintaining FOSS projects and offering patches 'isn't true'? That sounds arrogant on your part. The paper tries to guess gender from github nyms and profile pics, and looking for google + integration, this seems like a red flag to me. I couldn't guess gender or sex from that, especially considering regional differences, like anime pictures for profile pics, unless it was explicitly telling me in the name. What they may instead be partitioning is the aggressiveness / confidence of the nym and its presentation, which corrolates later to what happens at the first hurdle for their patches. For simple bug fixes, patches are typically acceptable right away. For more complex fixes and new features, some negotiation is needed with the maintainer as to how it should be done, there are often several ways that are reasonable, but eg, only one or two that align with future plans for the code. If the maintainer asks for a redo, a good proportion of contributors give up, they have exhausted their initial energy. Similarly, when asked for tests, or presented with considerations for other supported platforms the contributor doesn't care about, more give up. It requires extra confidence to approach the maintainer about preferred ways to do the patch before just starting on it. The maintainers are sometimes assholes (I am pretty sure, to everyone). I think it's very hard to unpick why patches didn't go anywhere unless you follow the story of each, certainly you need abnormal energy and confidence to get started and get over the hurdles for anything nontrivial.
eesmith 5y ago
> Open source contributors self-select. You are looking only at the last step into becoming a FOSS contributor. There are other selection filters you have missed, but which are touched on in the essay. The article mentions "the vast majority of open source contributors are either volunteers or work for sponsoring organizations." I believe that is correct. Those who work for sponsoring organizations aren't quite "self-selected", in that their employer is also involved, if only to grant copyright permission. I wouldn't say that all of the Google staff working on the open-source part of Chrome are self-selected open source contributors. Would you? And don't forget the article mentions a Fortune analysis that "the world’s biggest companies, who are the frequent sponsors of high-profile OSS projects, are still lagging behind in diverse hires." That's a selection filter right there. Even if all FOSS contributors are self-selected, there are clearly systemic biases in who is able to make a decision. Consider the mentioned "unpaid care work", which includes raising children and taking care of the elderly. Many societies regard this as a woman's responsibility, so even if two people have to decide to spend their volunteer time working on open source vs. doing unpaid care work, a man in those cultures may find it easier to "self-select" open source development than a woman might. > If you think there should be more people sending patches or running FOSS projects, bring them Someone working two jobs to support a family has little free time for open source development. Someone working part-time at a job and full-time child minding also has little free time. OTOH, someone with money can have a job with the evenings off, can pay for a babysitter, can order food instead of cooking, etc. As a result, poor people are underrepresented in open source software development if only because of the lack of available free time. Historic racism in the US contributes to the modern correlation between wealth and the social construct of "race". Blacks, for example, are more likely to be poor, and therefore less likely to be in a position to be able to "self-select" in the first place. Personally, I see Universal Basic Income as a way to get a lot of good open source developers, by increasing the number of people who are able to volunteer. > I don't know of any FOSS project who asks, or cares, about race or sex or anything else except code Have you missed the last 10 years of discussions about FOSS projects that have actively removed the use of "master/slave"? That sure sounds like FOSS projects which (at least claim to) care about race. Here too you are looking only the end point of the process - someone who contributes to a FOSS project. Those who have removed "master/slave" argue that such terms may inhibit people from becoming a FOSS contributor in the first place. Similarly, a FOSS project with a Discord project discussion channel where the developers regular post pictures of sexy women might disproportionately inhibit contributions from women. Even if they are completely wrong, my point is that there are many selection filters beyond "does a project accept or reject code based on the contributors race, sex, etc."

normdeplume2 5y ago

I'm not sure if you read the article, but literally every one of your points is clearly addressed Open source contributors self-select. > Yes, and if the environment is hostile to people of colour, or specific genders, they obviously won't contribute. They have to put time in, usually for $0 and often without thanks > Right. As the author states in a comment below the piece: "Open source work should be paid work, and, until it is, it shouldn't be a requirement to getting a job -- that only increases inequity when so much of the unpaid care work falls on those already minoritized by tech and open source." I don't know of any FOSS project who asks, or cares, about race or sex or anything else except code, or if the project is ill-maintained, at least your patch will get just as ignored regardless of your background. > So how do you explain all the research that tells you this isn't true? Such as this piece - https://peerj.com/preprints/1733/ https://peerj.com/preprints/1733/ - cited in the article.

raxxorrax 5y ago
The data of the study doesn't reflect these conclusions to be honest. The most simple one, that women engage in far fewer numbers explains all observable effects in my opinion. Also the users the data observes are found on Github and Google+. This is a insufficient data if you write about the open source community in general. The implicit bias test the authors used to certify themselves have problems justifying their relevance.
- chhum 5y ago
  "The most simple one, that women engage in far fewer numbers explains all observable effects in my opinion." > Well yes. But why do you think that is? If OSS is, in general, hostile to woman (and I would suggest that it is) than obviously fewer of them engage with it. Of course that same problem is reflected all the way up the chain - fewer woman become programmers because computing is hostile to them - a trend which starts at school and has been the case since about the 1980s.
fivelessminutes 5y ago
> I'm not sure if you read the article > As the author states in a comment Ie, not in the article. Can you elaborate on how that paper 'tells me' my own lived experience the last 20 years maintaining FOSS projects and offering patches 'isn't true'? That sounds arrogant on your part. The paper tries to guess gender from github nyms and profile pics, and looking for google + integration, this seems like a red flag to me. I couldn't guess gender or sex from that, especially considering regional differences, like anime pictures for profile pics, unless it was explicitly telling me in the name. What they may instead be partitioning is the aggressiveness / confidence of the nym and its presentation, which corrolates later to what happens at the first hurdle for their patches. For simple bug fixes, patches are typically acceptable right away. For more complex fixes and new features, some negotiation is needed with the maintainer as to how it should be done, there are often several ways that are reasonable, but eg, only one or two that align with future plans for the code. If the maintainer asks for a redo, a good proportion of contributors give up, they have exhausted their initial energy. Similarly, when asked for tests, or presented with considerations for other supported platforms the contributor doesn't care about, more give up. It requires extra confidence to approach the maintainer about preferred ways to do the patch before just starting on it. The maintainers are sometimes assholes (I am pretty sure, to everyone). I think it's very hard to unpick why patches didn't go anywhere unless you follow the story of each, certainly you need abnormal energy and confidence to get started and get over the hurdles for anything nontrivial.

eesmith 5y ago

> Open source contributors self-select. You are looking only at the last step into becoming a FOSS contributor. There are other selection filters you have missed, but which are touched on in the essay. The article mentions "the vast majority of open source contributors are either volunteers or work for sponsoring organizations." I believe that is correct. Those who work for sponsoring organizations aren't quite "self-selected", in that their employer is also involved, if only to grant copyright permission. I wouldn't say that all of the Google staff working on the open-source part of Chrome are self-selected open source contributors. Would you? And don't forget the article mentions a Fortune analysis that "the world’s biggest companies, who are the frequent sponsors of high-profile OSS projects, are still lagging behind in diverse hires." That's a selection filter right there. Even if all FOSS contributors are self-selected, there are clearly systemic biases in who is able to make a decision. Consider the mentioned "unpaid care work", which includes raising children and taking care of the elderly. Many societies regard this as a woman's responsibility, so even if two people have to decide to spend their volunteer time working on open source vs. doing unpaid care work, a man in those cultures may find it easier to "self-select" open source development than a woman might. > If you think there should be more people sending patches or running FOSS projects, bring them Someone working two jobs to support a family has little free time for open source development. Someone working part-time at a job and full-time child minding also has little free time. OTOH, someone with money can have a job with the evenings off, can pay for a babysitter, can order food instead of cooking, etc. As a result, poor people are underrepresented in open source software development if only because of the lack of available free time. Historic racism in the US contributes to the modern correlation between wealth and the social construct of "race". Blacks, for example, are more likely to be poor, and therefore less likely to be in a position to be able to "self-select" in the first place. Personally, I see Universal Basic Income as a way to get a lot of good open source developers, by increasing the number of people who are able to volunteer. > I don't know of any FOSS project who asks, or cares, about race or sex or anything else except code Have you missed the last 10 years of discussions about FOSS projects that have actively removed the use of "master/slave"? That sure sounds like FOSS projects which (at least claim to) care about race. Here too you are looking only the end point of the process - someone who contributes to a FOSS project. Those who have removed "master/slave" argue that such terms may inhibit people from becoming a FOSS contributor in the first place. Similarly, a FOSS project with a Discord project discussion channel where the developers regular post pictures of sexy women might disproportionately inhibit contributions from women. Even if they are completely wrong, my point is that there are many selection filters beyond "does a project accept or reject code based on the contributors race, sex, etc."