Though their argument is not always applicable, they do have a point. Expecting an entire industry to grow and flourish based almost entirely upon donated time is a bit Communist in its expectation of altruism. In a recent talk called -The Open Source Triple Play" given by Michael Tiemann, Vice President of Open Source Affairs at Red Hat, Inc., it is pointed out that more than 90% of open source developers are employed as proprietary software programmers. This tells us that for most, including myself, writing open source software is done -after hours" in a hobby environment.
Read: It's like we're holding down two jobs.
Of course, that assumes the developers put equal time into both activities, which is unlikely. In the event of any sort of financial or familial disaster, which activity do you think would be the first to be removed from the developer's schedule? Obviously the hobby would.
I'm sure this will raise the ire of many a reader, who will point to successful open source companies and projects like Linux that are huge but were done in that same free time, but such an irate reader will be missing the bigger point I'm making. We all know that hobbyists can create amazing software. We know that because it's been done. What we should be striving for, though, is a software development environment in which those same developers can do exactly what they love, with exactly the same quality, and not have to hold down another job as well.
Is there anybody out there, FOSS devotee or otherwise, who honestly believes that if these developers could focus more of their time on their open source projects that the world would be worse off?
Hear me loud and clear: OPEN SOURCE DEVELOPERS DESERVE TO BE PAID. Cash money. In our pocket. Today. Yesterday! Even in a Socialist system, the individual is expected to be able to survive as a result of their contributed work. What sort of system are we building here? A development environment where writing software is like playing Dungeons & Dragons (that is, done mainly by -academic individualists" late at night for fun and no pay)? It's anti-economic intellectual onanism at best, and at worst, a system that makes the most inspired contributors suffer at the hands of Capitalist -daytime owners".
It's all quite tricky in the current environment, in which open source projects are started as grassroots efforts, usually completely unfunded, and perhaps even misguided. Where is the money to pay developers supposed to come from? What happens when the project dies?
I have a proposal. It can be done with existing technology, requiring only a bit more software development to build the infrastructure, and perhaps some legal personnel to make sure everything is fair. I call it -Pay Per Useful Contribution".
The specifics could be determined on a project-by-project basis, but the general idea is that any developer can contribute to any project, just like today, but projects would offer a payment mechanism based on some metric, such as -Number of Source Files Contributed" or -Number of Lines of Code Contributed". This metric value would be applied to a multiplier, and a contributor's score would directly determine his or her payment. Payments would be generated from either a pre-existing pool of cash (if available) or as proportionate percentages of income from eventual sales of the product.
For example: -UltraSoft's BigEngine Project" pays on a per-line basis. Bob Olsen contributes 1000 lines of code to the project, and Kelly Jones contributes 500 lines of code. 200 of Kelly's 500 lines, though, replaced some of Bob's, and this was approved by all parties. In the end, Bob has 800 Line Credits, and Kelly has 500. This means the total Line Credits are 1300, of which Bob has 61.5%, and of which Kelly has 38.5%. When the product ships, it has $10,000 of sales in the first week. Assuming there were no other developers involved, Bob would take home $6150, and Kelly $3850.
If you create value, you should be paid based on how much value you create.
Of course I've simplified the idea for this article, but it's only meant to be food for thought. Developers in the open source community need something like this. Desperately. It would not only encourage more contributions to open source projects, but would tend to encourage customer relationships (to increase income) and many of the other benefits of Capitalism.
And of course, it would let us stop holding down two jobs. Then we'd have more time for...Dungeons & Dragons???
Brandon Franklin is an independent Java Software Engineer living on the Gold Coast. He writes open source software, but doesn't play Dungeons & Dragons anymore.
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Taran Rampersad - 03/12/04
The SLOC metric (Single Line Of Code) doesn't work. The bottom line is that the Free Software and Open Source developers have to learn to run themselves as businesses.
Doctors have the same problem. All that medical school to end up running a private practice - but nobody really teaches a doctor how to start their own private practice.
I write FOSS code as I have time (which seems to be never these days), but when I do, I decide whether I am doing it for money or not. If I expect to get money out of it, I have to approach it like business and make business decisions. If someone will pay me to write the code, then obviously I write the code. But if I'm shooting in the dark and I need to pay the bills - guess what? I don't write the code.
What this all leads up to is building a solid reputation and doing software cost guesstimation. SLOC can be faked (ask IBM), and further SLOC doesn't work with object oriented programming at all.
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2
D.J. - 04/12/04
But how are the contributions going to Open Source, when the "product" is being sold at all that profit?
Seems most O.S. projects don't generate that much sales, am I missing something?
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3
R. Fennimore - 04/12/04
Perhaps we could figure out a system where the people who profit from open source software (ie: Red Hat, SuSE, etc) could give some back to the community, where it could be divided up in some way for the original developers. Logistically very difficult, but I suppose theoretically possible.
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4
J.P. Pasnak - 04/12/04
You assume that the only renumeration that is acceptable to a software developer is cash, and fail to realize that the greatest return an open source developer gets is the use of other open source code.
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5
Hacker - 06/12/04
> If you create value, you should be paid based on how much value you create.
First rule of the free market: goods will be sold for the amount someone is willing to pay for them. Everything else is nonsense.
People *are* getting paid for open source work, provided they do some *really good* work. Linus, Alan Cox, Andrew Morton, Urlich Drepper, Ingo Molnar, MySQL folk, PostgreSQL folk and countless others are all getting paid. No need to invent any new system, just have something (i.e. skills that others want) and you'll get paid. It's that simple.
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6
aaa - 06/12/04
Turning free software contributions into monetary value for yourself requires finding a business model around for it. Don't expect it to be easy. Don't expect everybody to be interested. Some people just want to study existing code, and add their 2 cent.
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7
Peter Bradley - 07/12/04
I listened to the talk and didn't hear the comment that is quoted.
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Peter Bradley - 07/12/04
I listened to the talk and didn't hear the comment that is quoted.
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Tom Dison - 07/12/04
Everything makes sense except the $10,000 sales. I really don't see how many open-source projects will generate this much sales when someone will just post the code (and probably some binaries) on their FTP site, and now everyone cam download it for free. It always seems to come down to people paying out of the "goodness" of their hearts, or because they get a "fully-supported" version. I'm not sure that translates into big bucks. I pay for a lot of "Free as in Liberty" software, but I think I am in a serious minority.
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Jim Elliott - 07/12/04
It is also important to note that today a great many open source developers are working for companies who pay them to work on OSS on company time. For example, IBM has hundreds of developers who work on OSS full time, including Linux, Apache, Samba, etc. And it is not just IT companies, I know of several developers whose companies pay them to work 1/2 time on company projects and 1/2 time on OSS to give something back to the commmunity. This seems to be a growing situation and may be a "better way" to "pay" OSS developers for their time.
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11
Andre Felipe Machado - 07/12/04
Hello,
I strongly suggest you to read
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/29/paranoia.html
By reading this, you could realize "some" of the spirit behind FOSS.
Also, read some of the Bruce Perens and Eric Raymond papers when foss makes and when *does not* make sense.
Also, many foss devs are being paid by their bosses to code some needed improvement needed by the company. The most visible example is IBM contributions to linux.
Regards
Andre Felipe
af-machado AT uol.com.br
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12
Uno Engborg - 07/12/04
My guess is that most FOSS developers are paid.
The article seam to assume that most software is baught in schrink wrapped boxes. Guess what it is not.
Most development is done in house by companies that are not software houses but need software to conduct their business. The one cheep way to get software is to use open source. Somtimes these developers neeed a new functionality, or encounter a bug that they fix and somtimes that code gets back to the community.
Have done that myself many times.
Another group of programmers would be consultants that use open source code to advertice their skills. This means that they are not paid for their free software, but if they didn't write it nobody would hire them to do other more or less related work.
So even if there is no direct link between the number of lines of code you write there is very often a reward in the form of cash looming in the background.
By the way, the codeline model would not work, that would just encourage bad design.
The best and most valuable code is often the shortest and sometimes people contribute considerably just by having ideas on how something should be designed without even writing a single line of code.
One other factor to consider in free software is that you often have low marketing costs. In a schrink wrapped software project, the people that actually do the coding could end up with as little as of 10% of the profit, the rest goes to advertising, marketing, transports,... If that is your expectations as a programmer there is an incentive to take some risks and do some free work in the hope of landing some kind of support contract based on that work.
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13
Uno Engborg - 07/12/04
My guess is that most FOSS developers are paid.
The article seam to assume that most software is baught in schrink wrapped boxes. Guess what it is not.
Most development is done in house by companies that are not software houses but need software to conduct their business. The one cheep way to get software is to use open source. Somtimes these developers neeed a new functionality, or encounter a bug that they fix and somtimes that code gets back to the community.
Have done that myself many times.
Another group of programmers would be consultants that use open source code to advertice their skills. This means that they are not paid for their free software, but if they didn't write it nobody would hire them to do other more or less related work.
So even if there is no direct link between the number of lines of code you write there is very often a reward in the form of cash looming in the background.
By the way, the codeline model would not work, that would just encourage bad design.
The best and most valuable code is often the shortest and sometimes people contribute considerably just by having ideas on how something should be designed without even writing a single line of code.
One other factor to consider in free software is that you often have low marketing costs. In a schrink wrapped software project, the people that actually do the coding could end up with as little as of 10% of the profit, the rest goes to advertising, marketing, transports,... If that is your expectations as a programmer there is an incentive to take some risks and do some free work in the hope of landing some kind of support contract based on that work.
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14
Bill Mason - 07/12/04
This argument is getting really, really old, and I thought already thoroughly debunked, but some of us obviously still don't get it, so we're at it again.
1) Open source programmers are predominantly paid. By companies. Big fat paychecks.
2) The hobbyist approach is MORE sustainable than the paid approach. When you have a bottom line to meet, the agenda changes on a quarterly basis. What you're happily using one day may be slipped out from under you at anytime. Compare Debian (all-volunteer, the oldest and most sustainable distribution) with Red Hat and Caldera.
It works because people love it. People love it because it's THEIRS. They own it. We own it. It's ours. I can write some code and open source it, and a few months later, it will have undergone tremendous growth, fixes, and garnered a nice community following who all love it. That's mine. Not some company's. You can't buy this.
As for peoples' hobbies playing second fiddle to other things, big deal? It happens all the time. A developer leaves, and another one takes his place. There are thousands of us. We're like ants. We're everywhere. And we're not going away.
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15
Bill Mason - 07/12/04
One more thing.
What you propose already exists. It's called SCO Marketplace. Go hog wild.
Laughable? Why? Because nobody likes or trusts SCO? That's my point. You can't gather a community unless people like and trust you. Community is what makes free software work.
Okay, if you don't want to touch SCO with a ten foot pole, then why don't you start your own? There are no laws against doing what you propose. Go do it. Let us know how you do. You may not want to quit your day job just yet.
The problem is that money attracts a certain type of crowd. Just think of all the nut cases who have come out of the woodwork when they saw all the money being thrown around in open source software. This is what you're inviting when you create such a venture. The wrong element.
Money cannot compete with thousands of devoted people. If it could, Microsoft would have thought of it by now.
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16
Derick Centeno - 07/12/04
There is ALREADY a model for programmers to get paid for their independent efforts -- it's called "shareware".
If programmers participating in open source don't wish to do so -- then they shouldn't do so. No one should do nonpaying jobs they don't want to do, there are enough of those all over the planet. Such jobs are categorized and recognized in many societies by the term -- parents! Also associated family members who participate in educating, raising or supporting others. The list of course, goes on and includes the concept of volunteers. Also teachers and students giving their time for research or a learning project or other educational effort.
There are many things which have incredibly important value which cannot be assigned monetary scales, and in fact would become devalued if money entered the equation or process of consideration.
Many social and economic systems (not just Communist or Socialist) rely heavily upon such voluntary and free contributions by various members of society regularly. Indeed, if money were considered for each and every human activity the concept of generosity or the phrase expressed in English (and understood perfectly well in all human languages) "giving freely from the heart" would cease. The fact that it has not and it's continued existence, as a concept and actuality, in all societies (even Communist ones) reveals a human understanding easily understood and highly valued and respected as a seperate value from a business or financial transaction.
If there is a software project that is so uniquely useful and of value to the professional business, science and/or political environment and it is a truly useful idea...such a project may start off as a hobby but should move and gravitate to some sort of corporate structure. It can become a non-profit entity which produces a shareware product for particular usage or it can become a profit making corporation producing the same product at reasonable competitive prices for use by a particular market. The programmers or designers merely have to decide what they wish to do and then work like madmen or madwomen; I recall a term which applies to this kind of effort although it originated at a time when floppy drives were new and much less than 1.44MG. The term is "blood on a disk", and there is no question that the effort involved in many projects is very demanding. However once they can start the project, find investors, managers, etc. the company can pretty much runs itself and the programmers can walk away wealthy or at least modestly comfortable, after it has been sold. Of course, such a project which moves in that direction is no longer open source.
Open source is very much a "public" effort; if someone walks away any other may come in and partipate. Open source is unique as a learning space for new and inexperienced students and/or even professionals. Because in the world we live in today one would need several doctorates to truly master the important scientific areas and one has not considered yet technological applications in the engineering sense! In short, it may not be possible for any one human being to know even the complete subject of one area of modern science or technology.
Therefore something like open source must exist just to allow for the masses to have a chance to learn, and if not catch up, at least approach what is currently possible in the modern world. Between the availability of public libraries which are open to any citizen and open source -- an individual has very much a chance to at least approach awareness of a great deal.
With consideration to those programmers feeling a bit abused regarding this situation I recommend they quit the open source project and develop their own corporate entity. Money will follow them eventually or not as the hazards of business is a different challenge. For the rest who "get it" no amount of thanks is necessary as the use of what they have produced is in
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17
Alex - 07/12/04
I've thought along these lines too. You can't work on lines of code however. What would work best is to swap shares for the inclusion of that persons copyrighted code.
So in return for you taking in and using their code you and they agree what it is worth in terms of the current project in terms of a share in ownership.
This also has the problem of course of complexity as a project grows (along with others I'm sure) but that is how I have been sketching company articles to cover. With work organised on a per project basis.
I suppose it might need a micro payments royalties style system too. So that other projects can use your code (within the paying for it set of projects) and in return for taking code to use they agree a royalty payment, perhaps as a tiny share of profits from each sale?
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18
Ganesh Prasad - 07/12/04
Don't be surprised if the contributions dry up. I read about a study that compared countries where blood donation was voluntary versus countries where it was compensated with money. The volunteer system attracted better quality blood. Offers of money ended up motivating the wrong kind of people. Volunteer donors tended to have better quality blood, and they were largely motivated by altruism and put off by offers of money.
http://www.eastonbh.ac.nz/article291.html
http://www.ex.ac.uk/~RDavies/arian/wired.html
So, although well-meaning in your intentions, I think you may have missed the point. People have a deep-seated need to feel useful. Contributing to a worthwhile cause makes people feel useful. Pay them for their work, and you cheat them out of a good feeling.
You may be able to invent and institute a system to compensate Open Source developers, but as I said, don't be surprised if the contributions dry up or if the quality of Open Source software deteriorates as a result. You may attract lines of code all right, but it may be from people who care more about the dollars than about pride in work. We will all lose from such a system.
Regards,
Ganesh Prasad
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19
Ganesh Prasad - 07/12/04
Don't be surprised if the contributions dry up. I read about a study that compared countries where blood donation was voluntary versus countries where it was compensated with money. The volunteer system attracted better quality blood. Offers of money ended up motivating the wrong kind of people. Volunteer donors tended to have better quality blood, and they were largely motivated by altruism and put off by offers of money.
http://www.eastonbh.ac.nz/article291.html
http://www.ex.ac.uk/~RDavies/arian/wired.html
So, although well-meaning in your intentions, I think you may have missed the point. People have a deep-seated need to feel useful. Contributing to a worthwhile cause makes people feel useful. Pay them for their work, and you cheat them out of a good feeling.
You may be able to invent and institute a system to compensate Open Source developers, but as I said, don't be surprised if the contributions dry up or if the quality of Open Source software deteriorates as a result. You may attract lines of code all right, but it may be from people who care more about the dollars than about pride in work. We will all lose from such a system.
Regards,
Ganesh Prasad
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20
Nicholas Donovan - 08/12/04
Bzzt. Wrong. Every time I hear these pseudo-intellectuals spewing things like "Open Source is communism", I want to retch.
As a retired US Marine Corps Officer I fought against Communism for many years. I know what it is first hand.
Open Source is simply the scientific principle applied towards software development. Open Peer Review.
So many people believe Microsoft has some secret Mojo they put into their code and are willing to give them a pass on their miserable, insecure excuse for software.
Today, as a CEO of software/services company that deployes a lot of Open Source software, I can tell you first hand it is more scalable, secure and robust than any product Microsoft has put out.
The companies that helping to deploy it are also the same ones that add to it.
The features are added on as 'as needed/is pragmatic' basis. It's the surest method to insure that the features clients are requesting make it into the software and a safe method to insure against software bloat.
In the end, it's about doing the right thing for the customer, using scientific principles to build software and getting paid well to do so.
What was your point again?
Have a better one,
Nick
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21
Stomfi - 08/12/04
A bit Communistic, is incorrect. Communists get paid. Volunteers usually work for religious or humanitarian organisations. FOSS has many humanitarian aims, especially for thos people in countries other than the USA.
Don't forget that the USA maintains its high standard of living by comsuming most of the rest of the world's resources, for which they pay very little to those other countries.
So FOSS is a very humanitarium way of redressing the balance, not at all communistic, which only shares within country specific communities.
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22
Daniel Glazman - 08/12/04
Although I completely agree with the basis of your aticle, I find your proposal completely unrealistic, and impossible to apply.
Daniel
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23
Vladimir T Martinov - 09/12/04
A fair point! In a materialistic society ruled by the economics of currency, it is expected that the work one does is rewarded in (mostly) monetary terms.
The Open Source and Free Software idea as we know it today, though is slightly out side the rules of the economic society that it controversially exists in. If I were to look at the Maslow’s Pyramid of Needs I can find the Open Source and Free Software fitting right on top – the need for self actualisation. It is a controversy to demand payment for self actualisation as usually the reward of self-realisation is measured in satisfaction in the person – rarely materialistic. With the desire to fulfil potentials comes the need for relaxation – which does (mostly) come at a cost.
This brings two things to mind:
1. Either the Open Source software engineers do not like to have leisure time away from their favourite toy and in it they love to code and contribute, or
2. The software engineers are not paid enough to generate the extra spend to enjoy their spare time away from their favourite toy
The article suggest that the Open Source society is building the software based on the individual enthusiasm toward the achievement of a common goal.
I am not sure if there is a psychologist somewhere in the world who has had a look and/or has made an analysis for the motives, which drive the Open Source contributors. There are a lot of reasons why people would like to contribute to the Open Source society. A couple come to mind first: Sense of belonging, Sense of proliferation of ideas – freedom of speech…
Open Source and the Free Software is a very similar idea to Freedom of Speech, and other expression – if journalists are free to say what they feel is relevant and supports their story why should Software Engineers not be able to publish their work in just the same way? If I were to use the analogy all we need to have now is the publication, which will take the work of these souls and make it public (and maybe pay the contributors for their work – copyright issues anyone?)…
As to getting paid for the work one does – that is naturally a good offer! I am sure that once a payment scheme is in place and people find it viable – the Open Source society will only gain more attention, as more people will be given the initial motivation to delve in the waters of the Free Software. That on one side, on the other, we risk to have greediness take part of the altruist, enthusiastic and hobbyist environment created by the Open Source and Free Software idea as we know it today.
My guess is that the reality should be found somewhere in between: A good mix of truly free work as a result of the need of self actualisation to the benefit of the community with the possibility to see also some kind of material remuneration for the work done.
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24
nawab - 10/12/04
When programmers donate code because they like programming then paying them money doesn’t make sense. And if programmers code for money, then the submitted code maybe more then necessary and of poor quality hence not paying is in itself a QA safeguard.
Programmers are paid when users start using the software and need consultation, training, and specific features requests.
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25
Online Paid Survey - 03/10/06
If you want to make it a living on the Online Paid Survey industry there are a few things that you absolutely need to know, heed my warning. <a href="http://www.survey-scam.com">Online Paid Survey</a>
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26
Tania Collins - 22/05/07
Yes Hi,
My name is Tania as you can see i was wandering how i would be able to join
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