OSS Maintainer Obligations

Preach! Open source maintainers don’t owe non-paying users a thing. Open source isn’t a cheat code for getting work done for free. It’s a means of sharing work that was already done so that it doesn’t need to be done again by others.

Being allowed to contribute to open source is a privilege, not a right.You could also just pay for it.

I dislike the key suggestion. What's the point of open-source - if not to give back? It's a developer's codex/morale to answer.It seems the author is salty about the fact he doesn't make money from open source, but is investing a lot of time. Well my dear colleague, offer support to the bigger companies that use your software in production or use that software to sell another. Simple.Open source was never meant to be for-profit, at least from my understanding. Some

The main option right now for what you described is to contribute labor or money to open source projects, which many people do - but not nearly enough. The sad reality is that the vast majority of people, even well meaning ones, don't want to pay for things if they don't have to. And it is generally the case that if you are paying for something, you have a societally accepted moral standing to complain about it as a paying customer.

Then why the hell call it open source and contribute code to society? Work as a freelancer and ask money for it.

I'm not sure who this is aimed at, open source software developers seem to fall into two major categories:- employees at a company working on or using specific open-source software- passionate individuals (sometimes small groups, usually after an original author gets a following)The former are already paid, and the latter aren't in it for the money. The psychology of money is such that when you introduce money into the equation it becomes a "job", and people treat it as such. e.g. Would

You do realise that maintainers of open source projects don't owe you anything, right?

You sir have misunderstood the concept of open source software.As an open source author or maintainer you don't do the work for others and then expect some kind of compensation. The idea instead is to do the work that you would have done anyway because somebody else paid you or because you did it for fun, and then you publish it to use the community to help you fix issues. A philantropic motivation is nice but not necessary and just a minor side effect. And just as you don&

The other option is: Pick any of the above licenses and don't tie your entire financial identity to this thing.I think its a legitimately weird thing specific to software where people release something interesting as open source and free, it gets used, they feel an obligation to make building it their job, and then they feel anger when they don't make money from it. I understand the feeling of being slighted when there are billion dollar corporations using your software, but it was

why open source? it seems like the developer deserves to make some money out of it.