June was Maintainers Month and if you subscribe to this newsletter there is a good chance you have seen xkcd 2347 aka Dependency. It actually inspired The Non-Code Contributor. It is my north star, and I literally (I mean literally) have 2347 tattooed on my wrist so each day, I never forget about the open source maintainers that sacrifice their time and mental health, so the digital infrastructure doesn't collapse.
This issue is dedicated to those who don't get 20% time or are lucky enough to work full-time on open source. To all of the Nebraskans out there, we appreciate you. 🍻
💬 Discussions
Sustain OSS India Meetup
Sustain Together: July 1, July 15, and July 29
🖇 Links
The Flossbank Attempt.
I applaud the effort that Pete and Joel made with Flossbank. Richard, Eric, and I interviewed Joel back in 2020 and we discussed the challenges they would face, to be honest, I'm amazed they made it this far. It's really difficult to get open source developers onboard to new platforms even if it pays them. Eric and I know firsthand.
This copilot is stupid and wants to kill me
I expect that organizations that create software assets will have to forbid the use of Copilot and other AI-assisted tools
Fund OSS through package managers
"We all know the value and importance of open source software and yet many open source maintainers struggle with its sustainability. A big part of that struggle is the inability to cover the cost for the time and effort put into developing and maintaining a successful OSS project over a long period of time."
Nadia Asparahova (Eghbal): philanthropy, effective altruism, science funding
Nadia is the OG sustainer. Don't worry, despite the title, open source is mentioned 14 times in the podcast.
What does AI have in common with Open Source?
"OSI Executive Director, Stefano Maffulli, sat down with Richard Littauer and Justin Dorfman hosts of the podcast series Sustain and had an interesting conversation about our upcoming Deep Dive: AI event and what AI has in common with Open Source."
How we analyzed hundreds of repositories to ensure they had open source licenses
We’re excited to announce that our Open Source Program Office (OSPO) is now up and running!. One of my first tasks was making sure our open source software is in compliance with the Open Source Definition (OSD).
Ok before you call me a corporate shill, hear me out. License compliance as we all know is super-duper important and I wasn't looking forward to it since I thought it would be a manual process. A tool we (Sourcegraph) makes allowed me to do it quickly and I believe other OSPOs would find that valuable.
📰 Articles
Open source developers urged to ditch GitHub following Copilot launch
While the Software Freedom Conservancy's beef with GitHub predates Copilot by some margin, it seems that GitHub's latest launch is the final straw.
🎙 Podcasts
Julia Ferraioli on Open Source Stories, and Responsible Recognition for Open Source Contributions
"Julia shares about her background, what Open Source Stories is, and how she quantifies a black swan open source."
I really enjoyed this conversation, I think you will too.
GitHub Maintainer Month with Mike McQuaid of Homebrew and Nina Breznik of DatDot
"SustainOSS teamed up with GitHub for maintainer month. Mike of Homebrew talks about his experiences being a maintainer; Nina of DatDot shares how she helps other people see being a maintainer as art, not just science."
GitHub Maintainer Month with Marie Kochsiek of drip and Hélène Martin of ODK
"Marie goes in-depth about her experience maintaining drip, a local storage period tracker; Hélène talks about ODK’s funding model and her role as the CTO."
Disclaimer: All links that I (Justin) post in any newsletter issue are what I find exciting, interesting, and or thought-provoking. I don’t agree with everyone but do value their perspectives. All opinions are mine, not my employer’s or any affiliations I have with other organizations. ✌️