Comment by jaredklewis 2 months ago
This would be nice, but since it hasn’t happened so far, hard to see why it would start happening.
No idea what the future will look like in general in 5, 10, or 20 years but I am reasonably confident that donations to OSS won’t be drastically more than they are now.
Fair enough, but having worked inside a lot of tech companies I think I also have a pretty good sense of why tech companies don’t monetarily contribute more: no incentive to do so and because OSS is often chosen specifically to avoid costs.
Hard to see why those things will stop being true.
I think it’s pretty easy:
Refer to any manager or executive at a tech company who uses open source to generate profits but doesn’t contribute as a “deadbeat” — so their choice becomes a source of social embarrassment.
If you think companies care about embarrassment I have a nice house in Bhopal to sell you.
That's only if they agree with your description. I really don't see that happening. I just see the simple, factual retort: "we're not deadbeats, and if you wanted us to pay, you should have sold it to us instead of giving it to us for free."
Which is absolutely correct!
As an open-source author and maintainer, I have no desire or motivation to call any of my users "deadbeats", especially when I license my software under terms that specifically do not require any kind of payment. That would be pretty hypocritical, as I've used lots of open source software (both personally and professionally) without paying for it.
Is there a website where one can see some open source contribution metrics? I found https://opensourceindex.io/ , but the absolute numbers do not tell much by themselves; of course the biggest companies contribute more[1].
[1] apart from Meta and Apple, they seem ridiculously low.
Why would you say that? I believe the GP is correct. Unless something drastically changes, why would we expect companies to start getting generous, spending money they don't have to? Especially in the context of donations! If we're talking about a licensing shift that requires companies to pay, then sure. But for donations? I doubt it.
Actually no, historical data is the best indicator of future probability.
Terrible reason to believe something won't happen.