Open-Source Maintainers are Jerks!
summary
Argues that open source is licensed as-is with no SLA, so maintainers who close unpaid requests aren’t jerks but protect the project; cites Heartbleed (billions lost) and shows companies offloading support. Describes practical fixes: use Open Collective or Patreon for funding, reserve 20% time via Open Source Friday, add playground reproducibility apps, code-owners and CI to lower contribution friction. Gives numbers (webpack ~$400k/year, reactiveui ~$10k/year) and shows playgrounds actually work to turn issue reporters into pull-request contributors.
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chapters (13)
- 0:00We are both open-source maintainers
- 4:45Define open-source
- 6:34The cost of failure in open source: Heart Bleed
- 7:14The cost of failure in open-source
- 7:36We don't owe you anything
- 9:11A billion dollar problem
- 12:32Resetting expectations
- 16:23Roads and Bridges
- 18:05Contribute: Money or Time
- 30:38How much to contribute
- 31:38Contribution levels
- 36:48Level of Influence
- 42:15Call to Actions
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