Miles, I think your questions about the day jobs of OSGeo contributors would make a great online poll or survey. It would be interesting to get a look at that data.
Landon Office Phone Number: (209) 946-0268 Cell Phone Number: (209) 992-0658 -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Miles Fidelman Sent: Monday, November 16, 2009 3:20 PM To: OSGeo Discussions Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] OSGeo barriers to entry Tyler Mitchell wrote: > Perhaps we can turn the thread to discussing what are the real or > perceived barriers people, in general, find to getting involved with > OSGeo. I'm sure that any barriers women would have might also affect > others, so it might be useful to broaden the discussion so more > participate. > > 1 What barriers are there to joining OSGeo and its projects? Getting paid tends to be a big one. Seriously. Most of the successful open source projects I'm familiar with involved salaries or other work-related support. - University researchers working on grants (Apache) - Students working on thesis material (Linux) - IT staff developing software as part of their work, then open sourcing the software as a way to reduce ongoing support costs (Sympa) - Corporate developers open sourcing code to expand a user base (Erlang) - Government contractors working working on an SBIR contract (one of our current projects) - etc. Labors of love are fun, but ultimately most people have to pay the bills. I guess that leads to a central question: What are the day jobs of the core developers associated with OSGeo projects, to what extent are those developers paid to work on the projects, and what are the business reasons of their employers for doing so? -- Miles R. Fidelman, Director of Government Programs Traverse Technologies 145 Tremont Street, 3rd Floor Boston, MA 02111 [email protected] 857-362-8314 www.traversetechnologies.com _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss Warning: Information provided via electronic media is not guaranteed against defects including translation and transmission errors. If the reader is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this information in error, please notify the sender immediately. _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
