Dear Open Source Developers,
Yesterday, Peter Farrell published a letter to 'open source developers' pleading with them...no, actually, demanding of them, to stop asking for personal donations or even accepting 'wish list' items. Today, I am here asking you..no, actually, I am demanding of you, to do whatever you feel is necessary in order to continue to produce free, badass software.
It seems that if you solicit personal donations or accept purchases from your wish list, you are violating some OSS edict against such things. Peter seems to be putting other people down because they do not do OSS 'his way'.
I disagree with Peter's black and white stance - if you don't give it away freely, then you really do not love it. I see no issue with the author of OSS putting a link to their wish list in the 'read me' file. If I purchase a movie, book or video game from the wish list of an OSS author as a token of appreciation for their hard work and it allows them some 'down time' so they can 'recharge' and have the energy to continue their OSS project, I am all for it.
Peter says that people who do not give away the thing they love are greedy. I disagree here as well. I think the fact that they are writing OSS shows they are not greedy. The fact that some may solicit personal donations or mention they have a wish list is not 'greed', and if Peter thinks it is, maybe he needs to reconsider his definition of the word 'greed'.
I hope this letter to open source developers helps you realize that if you write OSS and ask for or accept personal donations and/or wish list purchases, you are doing nothing wrong. As long as you keep writing free, badass, open source software, I, and others, are OK with you asking, but not requiring, these conditions be met.
Keep up the good work!!
66 comments
Yes, I'm pissed.
if you love it, would do it for free but can also make money from it then why not??
I'll often make a small donation, people should do what they want with the software they write.
there are a few things that really bothered me about Peter's post. The 2 biggest are:
1. He presumes to know and understand everyone's motivation when it comes to writing OSS.
2. He demeans people for not doing OSS 'his way'.
This may not have been his point, but that sure is the way it came across to me.
I know Raymond Camden said he was going to reply to this anyway so i'll just use him as an example. Someone who contributes so much to ColdFusion and to my own personal knowledge of my trade without asking a single thing from me, I think they deserve it. Even though my "allowance" doesn't give me the flexibility to buy something for him, I've still let him know what his efforts mean to me and the rest of us. I read his blog among others and to me it's just like be buying a book to lean more.
For those of you who do provide your wishlist and/or ask for donations, don't stop. You deserve it.
To begin, I think it is incredibly presumptuous to assume why someone is giving away free software. There are many reasons people do this. Some are altruistic ("I want to make the world a better place"), some are commercial ("If we give away X for free, it may encourage folks to buy Y"), some are career based ("Giving away X will look good on my resume"), etc. I'd be willing to bet though that many open source efforts are a mixture of many reasons. Peter makes the assumption that by asking for a donation, the reason for building the OS project is greed. I've known many "donation-ware" projects in the 20+ years I’ve been in the business and I can't imagine every one of them is greed based. Setting up a wishlist so folks can show their appreciation is nothing more than that - a simple, fun way to allow folks to show their thanks.
Peter talks about his heart being in his open source projects. That's great, but do not presume to speak for my heart, or anyone else who is spending their free time creating free open source software that helps others.
One of the tools I love and use daily is Filezilla. (Which, by the way, has a Paypal donation button on it.) I don't know the name of the guy (or gal) who created it. I don't care why he created it. Maybe he wanted to impress a girl (or guy). Maybe he and his buddies ran over some homeless guy last summer while driving drunk. I don't care. His free tool helps me and damnit, I'm thankful for that. Whether or not his heart is in it does not matter to me. I've been helped by him and for me to question his motives is plain wrong.
Instead of questioning the motives of people sharing their hard work, why not help them? I've been giving away my software since the good ole days of the Allaire Tag Gallery. I didn't do it for political or philosphical reasons. I did it to share. I did it for fun. I loved ColdFusion and I wanted to share that love with others. Heck, I didn't even have a license of my code until I got burned by someone stealing and misappropriating my work. But to be honest - I don't think about the "Movement". Frankly, the "Movement" sometimes scares me. There seems to be a feeling by some in the OSS community that there is "One True Way" and that any code that violates this way, like for example, Adobe's commercial closed-source ColdFusion, is somehow evil and a burden to the planet. Frack that. It's code. Real evil exists and it's certainly not closed-source proprietary software.
I will say this - I've never felt LESS motivated to participate in open source.
The counter argument is that most open source developers are writing free software for one of three reasons, IMO:
1. gaining notoriety
2. gaining experience
3. opportunity for personal advancement
In all three of these cases, you could theoretically argue that these are all self-motivated, and therefore greedy.
One of my peers who worked with me on an open source project kindly pointed out to me that, regardless of what I told people my intentions were (providing a tool the community would use and appreciate), deep down my motivations were still self-serving. After some examination of my thoughts, I realized he was right.
So regardless of what reasons you are developing OSS for, they could still be misconstrued as greed.
I've never asked for anything for any OSS software I've written, but also don't mind when someone else does. It's my choice whether I decide to buy them something or not. I just don't see his post as negative I guess.
I do not take or expect any donations for any of my OS projects. Not because I couldn't use the money (I need a second job just to feed my kids) but because most of them just aren't really used that much. Well, except maybe the two people or so that use WhosOnCFC, the point being my projects have value to me, but who is to say what that value is to someone else.
If I did have a project that was widely used I wouldn't mind putting up a wish list or taking donations. Whether you are wrapping an API or writing a full scale application you still have your own investment of time that you gave freely. If someone wanted to show appreciation by way of a gift or donation so be it. My wife would probably just prefer they write it for me, but that is another story..
I'd rather have a ton of OSS with people who ask for donations or wish lists than only a few OSS projects that don't accept anything.
As TJ noted above, there are other "greedy" reasons to write OSS software outside of monetary gain. So should all OSS be written anonymously so people don't gain notoriety or don't get any new opportunities because of it? No. So why would we eliminate the ability for people to show their appreciation for OSS.
If other people use free projects and don't donate. OK. If some projects don't have wish lists or accept donations, that is their choice as well.
To say that people should stop developing open source unless they do it "for the right reasons" seems counter-productive. Like Ray said, what do I care why FileZilla developers made it? It still makes my life better.
If Ray said tomorrow that the only reason he ever developed OSS projects was to get famous and charge higher rates, I would be surprised, but I wouldn't care. Good for him!
There's one major point in Peter's post that I think many people here missed, if indeed they read Peter's post at all.
Given that as a rule we developers are decently well off, *for me personally* (better put that in there lest I find myself on the receiving end of some hatin') if someone likes some open source work I've done and wants to thank me for it monetarily, I'd much rather they give money to a worthy cause than send me another book, or video game, or some other doo-dad that I'll stick on a shelf and ignore while there are people in the world who have *real problems* and need *real help*. Me having Left4Dead 7 or a Kinect doesn't even help me, really, let alone anyone else. Just putting things in perspective.
I appreciate the gratitude. I really do. It puts a big smile on my face every time it happens, and that's all the inspiration I need to keep going. But at least currently (knock on wood) people other than myself would benefit vastly more from any concrete generosity that any work I've done may inspire in people.
Not everyone feels this way. I'm not telling anyone else how to run their affairs, and neither was Peter. But if the discussion gets people thinking, then all the better.
Ultimately everyone has to make their own decisions on why they do what they do, but to couch Peter's post as him wagging a finger at anyone in particular or saying he was putting anyone down for doing things another way is just idiotic. He was expressing an opinion, clearly it's something he feels passionately about, and I think ultimately he just wanted people to think about why they do what they do.
Why not just make the suggestion? Would that have been so hard to do? Why try to guess at the motivations of others?
And here is the crazy thing. If someone is offering you something for free, why not just be _appreciative_ of the fact and not worry about their motivations?
Railo is a consulting company. Of course they have a revenue model, just like Blue River, or outside the CF world just like Red Hat, or any number of businesses built around free software. I use and support Mura (yes, with a support contract), I use Red Hat (again, with a support contract), so I'm not sure what brush you're trying to paint me with exactly.
Given that I'm not sure I've ever even had an in-person conversation with you, I certainly take issue with you pretending to know a damn thing about me and my motivations, and I really don't appreciate the implications that I'm a hypocrite. I should have known better than to get sucked into trying to have a nuanced conversation on someone's blog comments. This never works well. Live and learn.
Back to the topic at hand, I took Peter's post to be aimed at individual developers who have a day job and do smaller open source projects on the side, so bringing Railo or any open source business into the mix is apples and oranges in my opinion. And again, this is his feelings on things. So you disagree. So what? Doesn't make either one of you wrong. Everyone has to do what works for them.
As for OpenCF Summit, yes, we got sponsorship (I take issue with your word "heavy" and singling out Railo since you have no earthly idea what you're talking about as far as how OCFS was run ...) from businesses relevant to the goals of the event and ran a great, well-attended, zero-profit event for which we charged the bare minimum we needed not to lose money. Not sure what hypocrisy you think you trapped me in with your comment.
Silly us for putting on an inexpensive event for the community. At least the people who actually came appreciated it.
I think that the motivation of those that freely give but allow others to show appreciation is far more transparent(if they were doing it to get rich they would sell their work), and often more noble, then many of the projects that are hoping to get people to use their project and then get in a position to need paid support or need to go to a paid version for certain features, not that there is necessarily anything wrong with those projects either, people should be able to use their work anyway they see fit without being called greedy.
With lines like:
'If you love something, just give it away. Don't ask for personal donations to fund your open source development. If your heart isn't in it, then you shouldn't be working on it. It's very easy to loose perspective on why you are involved in a project. If wishlist items or donations are the only thing that keeps you going, then just stop. You're efforts aren't helping anybody.'
It is difficult to think anything other than Peter 'wagging his finger'. Even in the title of the post, Peter is telling people how to 'run their affairs.' Maybe it was you who did not read his post?
I think its great that Peter asks for donations in lieu of 'personal donations' or wish list items. However, Peter has no idea what I, or others, do to support charities that mean a lot to us. So, to make accusations that I am 'greedy' because I have accepted wish list items as a token of appreciation for work I have done on OSS projects is the height of arrogance.
Peter very well may have had a wonderful and inspiring message to share, but, to me, that message got lost in the 'holier than thou' tone of the 'letter'.
One side note, I was fully aware that this post would likely lead to some 'name calling', but never in a million years would I have guessed it would have started with you.
Let's try to keep it classy guys.
I was encouraging people to consider the rest of the world. You don't have to share my personal view on what to do with personal donations.
I never called anybody greedy or singled out a single person or project. If you all want to get hung up on one phrase, then be my guest to continue bashing on it -- you all missed the point.
@Scott: At least my post got people talking about things. But the least you could have done was engage your thoughts as comments on my blog post first or least post a link to your thoughts on my blog.
@Jason: My dietary preferences have nothing to do this the subject a hand. It is a rather low-blow to indicate that is does. I know you and I don't share similar political views, but I've never used that against you.
@Todd: All conferences need sponsors in order for them to be produced. At least OpenCF Summit was inexpensive and affordable.
@Scott--I have no idea why you're saying the 'name calling' (as it were) started with me. I littered my original comment with "in my opinion," "for me personally," and "not telling anyone else how to run their affairs." Not sure how that's calling anyone names?
That was met with a well-reasoned comment from Ray (at least I understand where Ray's coming from and it's on topic, even if I disagree with some of the finer points) and then utter nonsense from Todd, to which yes, I felt the need to respond because it was so off-base, ill-informed, and accusatory. But nowhere do I see myself calling anyone any names.
To go totally off-topic, this to me is a fantastic illustration of the biggest problem with the CFML community. We simply can't have rational conversations about anything without descending into idiotic infighting.
Yes, I'm part of it in this case, and for that I sincerely apologize. I'll do better next time. But for crying out loud Scott, didn't you just have a "why can't we all get along" post? Does that only apply to other communities and not people within the CFML community at large who may have differing opinions?
At this point of course we're well off topic since what this really boils down to is some people took issue with their reading of the tone of Peter's blog post. Fine. Doesn't mean that interpretation is correct, but you're certainly entitled to it.
You are correct, I could have engaged this dialogue on your original post, but, to be honest, I do not like that in order to post comments to your blog, I have to login via Twitter, Facebook or Posterous - I cannot quantify why I dislike it..I just do.
@Matt - I guess where you come from, calling someone's opinions 'idiotic' are not 'name calling', but where I come from, it is.
As for as the 'can't we all get along' post, no, that was for everyone - but that did not mean we could not have differences of opinion.
It seems OK for Peter to share his opinion, but not OK for me or others to share ours. I expressed my perceptions of Peters post, and for that I have been called 'idiotic' and 'cowardly' - from two people I have a lot of respect for, no less.
I tried to reply on your blog but it required one of 3 external providers, posterous "which although I consider myself tech savy I do not understand and consider pointless"
facebook, which is for my friends and family not my account splashed over the internet
and twitter which I only ever login to directly via twitter not some 3rd party thing or even have to worry about it.
I use my twitter for twitter, my facebook for facebook and posterous not only do I not care about I don't want to know about.
If I could comment on your blog directly I would have.
Personally I find anyone contributing to OSS and especially frameworks without a secret pseudonym to be greedy.
however if they are open with there name and not trying to sell them self as a consultant or anything like that and have a wish-list then I think "this guy has an optional wish list and doesn't mind a book to help him study further, what a cool guy"
to be honest half of my above is crap, people should be able to do open source software for profit, many companies do, why not individuals?
not all software devs are well off, I know plenty of people starting out who aren't and many who have years of experience that aren't, what is wrong with people buying a book or dvd??
if someone writes heaps of cool cfml but their code never has jquery and I use there code and see their wishlist has a jquery book what is wrong with me buying them that book?
I already give 10% of my wage to non religious affiliated charities
I hope people are open to changing there views and letting others live and let live
Do you deny this?
"However, greed is a bottomless pit. If you love something, just give it away"
Also: "If wishlist items or donations are the only thing that keeps you going, then just stop. You're efforts aren't helping anybody."
Seriously? So if someone gives something away, and let's say their ONLY reason is to get girls and free beer, they aren't helping someone? Really? How can you explain this? If a free product helps you, in _what_ way does the motivation for giving away the free item make the product less useful for you?
Again - Peter - I ask you. Why didn't you simply make the suggestion? Why did you feel the need to put words/feelings in other people's mouths - and in my case - I am taking it personally. Maybe I'm wrong about that - but that's where it lies.
Like I said - your words did not help. If anything, they have made me rethink if it's worthwhile contributing. Hell, maybe I never meant to help anyone. Maybe I'm just a greedy bastard at heart.
All that being said, I think that some of you need some thicker skin... the outrage appears overboard. To actually get pissed off and angered over that blog post is pretty silly.
However, I feel that the title and that second paragraph poisoned the entire message.
While I didn't care for Peter's post, nor did I see any value in Todd's comment. Not everyone who disagreed with Peter's post must necessarily agree on everything else. I know you didn't say we did, but I thought the point needed to be made clearly.
So far, I think this discussion has been an expected mix of reasoned responses and heated rhetoric. While some of the heated rhetoric hasn't been helpful to a reasoned discussion, I would hate to think that is a worthy reason to forgoe discussion altogether. I may disagree with Peter on this point, but that hardly means that I don't appreciate hearing what he has to say.
Scott,
I reread his post again and even without the title and second paragraph I still would have disagreed with it. At that point, though, it is more silly than anything. Which is mostly how I took it. Silly in the sense of the XKCD Jeremy pointed to ( http://xkcd.com/871/ ).
Peter,
When I read someone saying "you all missed the point" then I think "Perhaps you didn't make it very well". I don't mean that to sound overly harsh. It has happened to me several times. I write something and see that people react in a way that indicates that what I wrote didn't do a good job communicating what I wanted. Better to think of how better to communicate the point then to blame the reader for having missed it.
I was (not so) subtly trying to point out that you are imposing your personal beliefs/morals on the rest of us and slighting those that believe differently. As far as I am concerned suggesting that OSS developers should not accept personal donations is just as silly as suggesting they should all be vegans.
You do things for your reasons, fine. But don't imply that others' motives are somehow wrong because they are not the same as yours.
Trust me these guys do it cause the love it and if I can get them something to say thank you then why shouldn't I? I worked with a OSS developer for 4 hours on Monday, during work hours to help me run down a bug. If you read this person's blog all he does is help people, all the time. Did he ask for anything, nope, just the satisfaction that we got it fixed. I dislike the word greedy, and people who use it truly have no idea what it means.
From this point on if I get anything from a wish list I'm going to write GREEDY BASTARD!!! on the to field.
"Pun Intended"
Does anyone else find it a little embarrassing?
A wise man once said there are people who - when given a bag of money - will complain about the bag.
Hey Peter,
I wanted to comment to say that while I agree with your intention here that having someone make a donation in the developer's name is a great and noble idea, I do think the tone here drifts off to where it comes off as judgmental. I know you and doubt that was your intent.
Personally, I don't see anything remotely "greedy" about asking for donations or wishlist items. Your work might potentially save the person countless hours of hard work on their own. The cost of that work, had you or your company needed to pay for it is worth far more than a minor token of appreciation. We're not talking about people getting rich off these things but rather a very rare item of maybe $30-60 in value?
Anyway, I guess what I am saying is, I think that perhaps the value of your message was lost in the delivery. It happens.
- Brian
Hey Peter,
I wanted to comment to say that while I agree with your intention here that having someone make a donation in the developer's name is a great and noble idea, I do think the tone here drifts off to where it comes off as judgmental. I know you and doubt that was your intent.
Personally, I don't see anything remotely "greedy" about asking for donations or wishlist items. Your work might potentially save the person countless hours of hard work on their own. The cost of that work, had you or your company needed to pay for it is worth far more than a minor token of appreciation. We're not talking about people getting rich off these things but rather a very rare item of maybe $30-60 in value?
Anyway, I guess what I am saying is, I think that perhaps the value of your message was lost in the delivery. It happens.
- Brian
Some interesting points on both sides and a lot to ponder. I find it interesting how the conversations choose to classify donations and their relation to greed. I am guessing many open source projects have had this discussion and certainly this has, in some form, played a part in things such as Creative Commons coming into being.
I wonder too if clearly defining these classifications would better suit the discussion. For example if someone has a wishlist for say books that have a direct correlation to the project would that be greedy? Not sure since I have not put anything into the open source space, so cannot fully appreciate the counter-argument.
So thanks, really appreciated the discussion and do really appreciate all the Open Source developers you really have helped a lot over the years.
love the passion!
So I just bought him a small gift on his wishlist.
Thanks again Ray, and keep up the great work.
-Jeff Gladnick
How does Peter telling a group of people they are wrong because he feels they do not have the right motivation to do OSS good for anyone?
As I said, I think he may have had a good message, but the delivery of that message was atrocious and came across as preachy and 'holier than thou'.
Apparently, Peter (and others) cannot admit that maybe his delivery was flawed and choose to put the blame on those of us who 'did not get the point'.
Nobody cares who started it. You're all pretty, ok? Now back to promoting the language we all love!
In the past few days, I have been called greedy, idiotic, cowardly and lame - all in a public forum - yet, somehow, I have been painted as the 'bad guy'.
@John: 0 comments?
Nice try...troll.
The point is you, John, Ray and Jason are now free to roll Peter back in on this discussion.
And folks, a request: if someone's comments are broken or disabled, just drop them a line before raking them over the coals like this.
We don't all have to agree and I don't think I was ever squarely on his side either. But in the interest of community, I think we can at least maintain some civility. Peter's done more for Open Source CFML than anyone on this page and I think its the least you could have done.
The point is you, John, Ray and Jason are now free to roll Peter back in on this discussion.
And folks, a request: if someone's comments are broken or disabled, just drop them a line before raking them over the coals like this.
We don't all have to agree and I don't think I was ever squarely on his side either. But in the interest of community, I think we can at least maintain some civility. Peter's done more for Open Source CFML than anyone on this page and I think its the least you could have done.
Yes Scott, there are only two comments, the second of which is from Peter, who writes: "I've been in contact with Posterous technical support and they admitted there is something broken with commenting via Facebook on blogs with custom domains. They were unaware of this before I notified them. This issue has not just affect Posterous. For example, Facebook login for the Engage app at CFO does not work either. In the meantime, I've enabled non-login comments with comment moderation until the issue is fixed."
Look guys, I'm not even squarely on his side either. I'm just asking for a little more civility. Peter's done more for Open Source CFML than anyone on this page and he deserves the respect of at least a heads-up that his comments weren't working.
Raymond Camden currently has 40 project(s) at RIAForge.
http://blogcfc.riaforge.org/index.cfm?event=page.m...
Scott Stroz currently has 3 project(s) at RIAForge.
http://flogr.riaforge.org/index.cfm?event=page.myp...
Brian Rinaldi currently has 7 project(s) at RIAForge
http://illudiumboltconnector.riaforge.org/index.cf...
Steve Bryant currently has 9 project(s) at RIAForge.
http://datamgr.riaforge.org/index.cfm?event=page.m...
Todd Sharp currently has 10 project(s) at RIAForge.
http://riaforgecfc.riaforge.org/index.cfm?event=pa...
and should I assume you know how to count?