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Most people don't complain about working a few hours of unpaid volunteer time on a worthwhile cause; whether that is donating to a soup kitchen on a Saturday or

Most people don't complain about working a few hours of unpaid volunteer time on a worthwhile cause; whether that is donating to a soup kitchen on a Saturday or fixing a bug in an OSS project during a couple evenings. The problem is that serious OSS projects (just like running a major charity organization) often require a lot more than a few evenings or a weekend here and there. Expecting people to donate thousands of hours of unpaid labor toward anything seems a bit extreme. If it is considered whining to expect some compensation for what amounts to another full-time job, then we should not expect anyone to stick with it for very long.

ineedasername 4y ago
>If it is considered whining to expect some compensation for what amounts to another full-time job, then we should not expect anyone to stick with it for very long. It's whining to expect compensation when a person knew what they were getting into or decides to stick with it even after it becomes more than they thought they were getting into & complains about compensation. Not sticking with it for long is exactly what I think people should do when it grows beyond their desire to devote so much time to it. If I created a charity and it grew to the point where I didn't have enough time to run it, and couldn't get enough donations to cover my financial needs if I stopped my normal job, I wouldn't write blog posts about how "The model for running charities is broken because volunteers can't get paid enough to keep them running!" If no one else was interested in running it I'd scale things back or gently, perhaps regretfully, wind things down. An OSS project is essentially a charity organization. And, while developers may not like it, charitable organizations that reach even modest sizes have to spend a significant amount of time soliciting donations & volunteer time. St. Jude's couldn't function and wouldn't be such a highly successful charity without having built up such a newtwork and put in that effort. OSS doesn't need a compensation model because one already exists-- that of other charities. For projects that get large enough to start experiencing problems like this I'd encourage them to incorporate as a charity, a 501(c)(3) in the US. That gives them an excellent pathway towards covering labor or other costs and provides an excellent pathway for corporate users to contribute financial resources in formal & tax deductible fashion than when someone puts up a paypal donate button or similar.

ineedasername 4y ago

>If it is considered whining to expect some compensation for what amounts to another full-time job, then we should not expect anyone to stick with it for very long. It's whining to expect compensation when a person knew what they were getting into or decides to stick with it even after it becomes more than they thought they were getting into & complains about compensation. Not sticking with it for long is exactly what I think people should do when it grows beyond their desire to devote so much time to it. If I created a charity and it grew to the point where I didn't have enough time to run it, and couldn't get enough donations to cover my financial needs if I stopped my normal job, I wouldn't write blog posts about how "The model for running charities is broken because volunteers can't get paid enough to keep them running!" If no one else was interested in running it I'd scale things back or gently, perhaps regretfully, wind things down. An OSS project is essentially a charity organization. And, while developers may not like it, charitable organizations that reach even modest sizes have to spend a significant amount of time soliciting donations & volunteer time. St. Jude's couldn't function and wouldn't be such a highly successful charity without having built up such a newtwork and put in that effort. OSS doesn't need a compensation model because one already exists-- that of other charities. For projects that get large enough to start experiencing problems like this I'd encourage them to incorporate as a charity, a 501(c)(3) in the US. That gives them an excellent pathway towards covering labor or other costs and provides an excellent pathway for corporate users to contribute financial resources in formal & tax deductible fashion than when someone puts up a paypal donate button or similar.