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I'm sorry but I have no sympathy. I turn down real jobs to work on my hobby. Why won't anybody pay me?? What does he expect to happen? I really don't get it. I

I'm sorry but I have no sympathy. I turn down real jobs to work on my hobby. Why won't anybody pay me?? What does he expect to happen? I really don't get it. If you like to work on opensource. Sure, do your thing. But if the benefit in CV building and personal satisfaction are not enough, why don't you stop doing it?

cyco130 3y ago
> why don't you stop doing it? Err, this is him announcing that he's stopping doing it.
aspyct 3y ago
Whether you know it or not, you have used libjpeg-turbo. In fact you are probably using it every day, it's just behind the scenes, just like openssl is. These projects deserve funding, if at least from giants like facebook & co.
- defrost 3y ago
  > These projects deserve funding, if at least from giants like facebook & co. Absolutely. Looking at: https://github.com/libjpeg-turbo/libjpeg-turbo/releases/tag/3.0.0 https://github.com/libjpeg-turbo/libjpeg-turbo/releases/tag/... one wonders what possible harm could come from leaving image decompression buffer faults from maliciously crafted jpegs in popular browsers and software unattended.
  - winter_blue 3y ago
    > one wonders what possible harm could come from leaving image decompression buffer faults from maliciously crafted jpegs in popular browsers and software unattended This is yet another reason a switch to a memory-safe language like unsafe-free Rust is highly imperative.
    - bombolo 3y ago
      I'm sure in a couple of years a new category of security bugs that can happily happen in rust will pop up.
      - mcherm 3y ago
        ...at which point the code written in C will suffer from BOTH categories of bug, while code written in any language whose compiler guarantees memory safety will not. Guaranteeing memory safety isn't just an overhyped benefit meaningful only to Rust fanboys. It is also one important reason why much code is written in Java, Python, or JavaScript. It is a valuable property for any language to have.
        bombolo 3y ago
        Rust doesn't guarantee memory safety in general… it is better at it than C for sure, but not impossible to have bugs there too. The 100% certainty you use to claim it's absolutely memory safe is the essence of the problem with the rust fanboys.
        winter_blue 3y ago
        I think you might need to define what exactly you mean by "memory safe". There is an entire class of bugs common to C and C++ that absolutely never happen in JVM languages, CLR languages, Rust, etc. This particular class of bugs of bugs never happen by design, because the language design simply does not permit them to occur ever.¹ ¹ I am obviously of course excluding bugs/exploits/unintentional-loopholes here that are in the JVM or CLR, or in the Rust compiler itself, that permit a program to "break out of its box", so to speak.
        bombolo 3y ago
        https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch15-06-reference-cycles.html https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch15-06-reference-cycles.html
sshine 3y ago
> What does he expect to happen? To get paid for doing open source. This is a plea for increased funding. You can think of it as a job application being broadcast. His software is clearly valued, but companies take 3rd-party dependencies for granted because they're just there and can be used for free. There are things a company can do to replenish the ecosystem: Give time or money to maintain projects they depend on. > if the benefit in CV building and personal satisfaction are not enough, why don't you stop doing it? I'm afraid you don't understand the basic premise: He is not (primarily) doing open source to promote his CV. He is (presumably) doing open source for ideology and lifestyle: because it provides a good work environment where you work on exactly what you want, provides value that scales beyond what a single company can create (but is otherwise somewhat harder to measure), and provides value to the global, general public, which is not something people with day jobs can claim as easily.
- isaacfrond 3y ago
  My brother in law is an artist. He paints beautiful pictures and writes a comic book. His lifestyle choice appears to be fulfilling for him. He also doesn't own a car or a house. Choices have consequences. Different than OP, he doesn't complain about it.
  - pjc50 3y ago
    So your complaint is effectively .. that you have to hear about this?
  - thomasz 3y ago
    I don’t think that there are companies out there making billions while relying on your brother in laws work without paying him a dime.
  - eviks 3y ago
    why do you complain about someone else complaining?
    - bavell 3y ago
jakkos 3y ago
This is such a bad take. Their "hobby" saves huge corporations large amounts of money. I don't understand how it's not obvious that they should chip in comparatively small amounts of money to make sure that the project stays updated and secure. Why bother funding open source at all, it's not like it's the foundation of the entire worlds infrastructure or anything.
- Aerbil313 3y ago
  Haha. That's the point. Everything would still work if no open source existed. Tech would just be far more centralized in the hands of a few companies who have all the software libraries. Progress and development of tech would be far slower. But the world would keep turning just fine. Open source exists only because of the programmers' love for programming, desire of attention and the desire to benefit other people's lives. Open source software mostly starts out as a surrogate activity. No company needs to fund individual open source devs. They'll go with whatever at hand, it doesn't matter, sometimes even hiring someone to continue the open source project the original dev abandoned cause lack of funding.
whizzter 3y ago
Your real job is made easier by low paid people like him, if not you'd be forced to spend time to (badly) re-implementing the JPEG standard. Just because "it helps the CV" doesn't mean that's an end goal in itself in the long run, and once a library is popular the implications (security issues!) of non-maintenance is far higher even if it started out as a "fun" project. This xkcd illustrates it perfectly, https://xkcd.com/2347/ https://xkcd.com/2347/
- rob74 3y ago
  Just wanted to post the same xkcd, then I thought someone already might have, and my suspicion was correct. I guess most here have already seen it at one time or other, but maybe some haven't yet...
stefs 3y ago
"open source" doesn't automatically mean it's a hobby project done in the free time for no compensation. sure, most projects are developed in this fashion but the concepts are only incidentially correlated. working on open source software is and can be a "real" job. the only difference to closed source software is that the source code is open - nothing else (simplified). if you want your hair cut, pay the hairdresser. if you're interested in the continued development of the project, pay the author. it's as simple as that. in this case there's not enough funding so the project is discontinued. doesn't get more professional and non-hobbyist than that.
- Pannoniae 3y ago
  This would work if the OSI wouldn't vehemently oppose usecase-based restrictions for open source. I think more people should say "it's forbidden to use it for <list things like LLMs, social media, etc.>, if you want to use it, buy a licence from me" Right now, those corporations just steal the code and sponsor the OSI's gatekeeping.
- mrighele 3y ago
  > working on open source software is and can be a "real" job. the only difference to closed source software is that the source code is open - nothing else (simplified). That is no small difference. In particular the business is completely different and if you want to make a living out of it, you should plan your job accordingly: find an employer that pays you to write the software, make a business around support for the software, open a twitch/YouTube channel and monetize it, etc., but asking people (or worse corporations) that have the right to use something for free to pay for it doesn't look to me like the best course of action. > if you want your hair cut, pay the hairdresser. if you're interested in the continued development of the project, pay the author. it's as simple as that. If you offer to cut the hair for free, you shouldn't complain that rich people don't pay for your services, and the "but everybody comes to me" is not a good enough reason, especially when being free is one of the motivations.
  - joshuaissac 3y ago
    > you shouldn't complain that rich people don't pay for your services You also should not complain when the hairdresser stops offering free haircuts.
boudin 3y ago
So, because it's open source, he can't ask for a salary and do some marketing to get funding? What entitles you to decide that this guy doesn't have the right to try to monetise his project?

cyco130 3y ago

> why don't you stop doing it? Err, this is him announcing that he's stopping doing it.

aspyct 3y ago

Whether you know it or not, you have used libjpeg-turbo. In fact you are probably using it every day, it's just behind the scenes, just like openssl is. These projects deserve funding, if at least from giants like facebook & co.

defrost 3y ago
> These projects deserve funding, if at least from giants like facebook & co. Absolutely. Looking at: https://github.com/libjpeg-turbo/libjpeg-turbo/releases/tag/3.0.0 https://github.com/libjpeg-turbo/libjpeg-turbo/releases/tag/... one wonders what possible harm could come from leaving image decompression buffer faults from maliciously crafted jpegs in popular browsers and software unattended.
- winter_blue 3y ago
  > one wonders what possible harm could come from leaving image decompression buffer faults from maliciously crafted jpegs in popular browsers and software unattended This is yet another reason a switch to a memory-safe language like unsafe-free Rust is highly imperative.
  - bombolo 3y ago
    I'm sure in a couple of years a new category of security bugs that can happily happen in rust will pop up.
    - mcherm 3y ago
      ...at which point the code written in C will suffer from BOTH categories of bug, while code written in any language whose compiler guarantees memory safety will not. Guaranteeing memory safety isn't just an overhyped benefit meaningful only to Rust fanboys. It is also one important reason why much code is written in Java, Python, or JavaScript. It is a valuable property for any language to have.
      - bombolo 3y ago
        Rust doesn't guarantee memory safety in general… it is better at it than C for sure, but not impossible to have bugs there too. The 100% certainty you use to claim it's absolutely memory safe is the essence of the problem with the rust fanboys.
        winter_blue 3y ago
        I think you might need to define what exactly you mean by "memory safe". There is an entire class of bugs common to C and C++ that absolutely never happen in JVM languages, CLR languages, Rust, etc. This particular class of bugs of bugs never happen by design, because the language design simply does not permit them to occur ever.¹ ¹ I am obviously of course excluding bugs/exploits/unintentional-loopholes here that are in the JVM or CLR, or in the Rust compiler itself, that permit a program to "break out of its box", so to speak.
        bombolo 3y ago
        https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch15-06-reference-cycles.html https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch15-06-reference-cycles.html

sshine 3y ago

> What does he expect to happen? To get paid for doing open source. This is a plea for increased funding. You can think of it as a job application being broadcast. His software is clearly valued, but companies take 3rd-party dependencies for granted because they're just there and can be used for free. There are things a company can do to replenish the ecosystem: Give time or money to maintain projects they depend on. > if the benefit in CV building and personal satisfaction are not enough, why don't you stop doing it? I'm afraid you don't understand the basic premise: He is not (primarily) doing open source to promote his CV. He is (presumably) doing open source for ideology and lifestyle: because it provides a good work environment where you work on exactly what you want, provides value that scales beyond what a single company can create (but is otherwise somewhat harder to measure), and provides value to the global, general public, which is not something people with day jobs can claim as easily.

isaacfrond 3y ago
My brother in law is an artist. He paints beautiful pictures and writes a comic book. His lifestyle choice appears to be fulfilling for him. He also doesn't own a car or a house. Choices have consequences. Different than OP, he doesn't complain about it.
- pjc50 3y ago
  So your complaint is effectively .. that you have to hear about this?
- thomasz 3y ago
  I don’t think that there are companies out there making billions while relying on your brother in laws work without paying him a dime.
- eviks 3y ago
  why do you complain about someone else complaining?
  - bavell 3y ago

jakkos 3y ago

This is such a bad take. Their "hobby" saves huge corporations large amounts of money. I don't understand how it's not obvious that they should chip in comparatively small amounts of money to make sure that the project stays updated and secure. Why bother funding open source at all, it's not like it's the foundation of the entire worlds infrastructure or anything.

Aerbil313 3y ago
Haha. That's the point. Everything would still work if no open source existed. Tech would just be far more centralized in the hands of a few companies who have all the software libraries. Progress and development of tech would be far slower. But the world would keep turning just fine. Open source exists only because of the programmers' love for programming, desire of attention and the desire to benefit other people's lives. Open source software mostly starts out as a surrogate activity. No company needs to fund individual open source devs. They'll go with whatever at hand, it doesn't matter, sometimes even hiring someone to continue the open source project the original dev abandoned cause lack of funding.

whizzter 3y ago

Your real job is made easier by low paid people like him, if not you'd be forced to spend time to (badly) re-implementing the JPEG standard. Just because "it helps the CV" doesn't mean that's an end goal in itself in the long run, and once a library is popular the implications (security issues!) of non-maintenance is far higher even if it started out as a "fun" project. This xkcd illustrates it perfectly, https://xkcd.com/2347/ https://xkcd.com/2347/

rob74 3y ago
Just wanted to post the same xkcd, then I thought someone already might have, and my suspicion was correct. I guess most here have already seen it at one time or other, but maybe some haven't yet...

stefs 3y ago

"open source" doesn't automatically mean it's a hobby project done in the free time for no compensation. sure, most projects are developed in this fashion but the concepts are only incidentially correlated. working on open source software is and can be a "real" job. the only difference to closed source software is that the source code is open - nothing else (simplified). if you want your hair cut, pay the hairdresser. if you're interested in the continued development of the project, pay the author. it's as simple as that. in this case there's not enough funding so the project is discontinued. doesn't get more professional and non-hobbyist than that.

Pannoniae 3y ago
This would work if the OSI wouldn't vehemently oppose usecase-based restrictions for open source. I think more people should say "it's forbidden to use it for <list things like LLMs, social media, etc.>, if you want to use it, buy a licence from me" Right now, those corporations just steal the code and sponsor the OSI's gatekeeping.
mrighele 3y ago
> working on open source software is and can be a "real" job. the only difference to closed source software is that the source code is open - nothing else (simplified). That is no small difference. In particular the business is completely different and if you want to make a living out of it, you should plan your job accordingly: find an employer that pays you to write the software, make a business around support for the software, open a twitch/YouTube channel and monetize it, etc., but asking people (or worse corporations) that have the right to use something for free to pay for it doesn't look to me like the best course of action. > if you want your hair cut, pay the hairdresser. if you're interested in the continued development of the project, pay the author. it's as simple as that. If you offer to cut the hair for free, you shouldn't complain that rich people don't pay for your services, and the "but everybody comes to me" is not a good enough reason, especially when being free is one of the motivations.
- joshuaissac 3y ago
  > you shouldn't complain that rich people don't pay for your services You also should not complain when the hairdresser stops offering free haircuts.

boudin 3y ago

So, because it's open source, he can't ask for a salary and do some marketing to get funding? What entitles you to decide that this guy doesn't have the right to try to monetise his project?