Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On Sun, 26 Aug 2018 at 21:36, Alexander Neundorf wrote: > Hi, > > ... > > We were close to being global > > I don't really understand what you mean with "global". Can you please > explain > ? > Being a go-to solution for office productivity work. -- regards, Jaroslaw Staniek KDE: : A world-wide network of software engineers, artists, writers, translators : and facilitators committed to Free Software development - http://kde.org KEXI: : A visual database apps builder - http://calligra.org/kexi http://twitter.com/kexi_project https://facebook.com/kexi.project Qt Certified Specialist: : http://www.linkedin.com/in/jstaniek
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Hi, ... > We were close to being global I don't really understand what you mean with "global". Can you please explain ? Thanks Alex
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On Friday, 24 August 2018 00:23:29 CEST Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > Now that I'm coming out of jetlag, catching up on email and so happy > to see the direction this discussion is taking. > > On Thu, Aug 23, 2018 at 7:51 AM Jeremy Whiting wrote: > > Hi All, > > > > On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 1:29 PM Adriaan de Groot wrote: > >> Mostly I'm repeating this item from Cornelius because it follows so well > >> from what Valorie *originally* asked, rather than a bunch of > >> misintepretations and discussing-something-else. > >> > >> On Monday, 20 August 2018 10:58:05 CEST Cornelius Schumacher wrote: > >> > I don't think that anybody has a problem with having a healthy > >> > ecosystem of > >> > companies around KDE. That's not the debate we are having. > > Slight pushback here: Boud has gotten negative feedback for having a > foundation to pay devels for Krita. Frank definitely got negative > feedback, enough to take ownCloud out of the KDE ecosystem. > > >> The thread started with Valorie exclaiming surprise that there was > >> pushback on the entire notion of having companies / paid development > >> around the KDE community. Some people have chimed in saying that that's > >> not what they hear at all, so at this point I'm inclined to say that > >> Valorie had the bad luck to run into one or two grumpy people. > > Possibly. However I've heard a lot of this over the years. It could > have been the same few grumpy people though; I didn't keep track. :-) > > >> [Disclosure: Cornelius is presumably paid to work on Free Software-ish > >> things throughout the week; I am paid to work on Free Software things > >> for at least half of the week, and am looking for more.] > > > > I also work on Free Software-ish things myself, but haven't done as much > > KDE stuff in the past few years. > > > >> But we could run a separate email thread with this question: > >> - do we (as a community) want an ecosystem of companies and paid > >> development>> > >> around KDE? > > This was my main question, and I and most answering here seem to say > YES. I believe that this growth is crucial to the on-going growth and > health of the KDE community. Right, I didn't find anyone objecting to that during Akademy either. If there's opposition against that (as previously indicated in this thread), I'd like to see the actual concerns so we don't have to speculate what those might be. > > I would argue that whether we as a community want that or not we already > > have it. I can name on a couple of hands quickly a number of community > > members that either are paid to work directly on KDE stuff or on free > > software in general and do KDE stuff in "Community" paid time by the > > company they work for. Yes, and it's like that even since before I joined KDE more than 15 years ago. So we do have quite some experience with the hybrid volunteer/paid setup, and we obviously managed to do that without killing volunteer contributions. > And to the extent this is true, and those companies make enough money > to keep paying them, this is a Good Thing. Blue Systems is great, but > do they have a plan to make money? As far as I can see, it seems to be > more a KDE charity. I think this is great, *and* I would like to see > profit-making companies surround us as well. Not just a few, but > *many* of them. Many of our applications, for instance, could be > world-class, and support small companies which in turn support them. > In addition, I'd like to see companies doing support for companies and > individuals using KDE software on Linux, Mac and Windows. I'd like to > see at least on the Windows Store many more applications making a bit > of money. Not sure if coming up with viable business plans is in scope for KDE, but "onboarding" companies that want to work with us for sure is. Ie. are there company-specific issues to look at as part of the onboarding goal? (All paid work I have been involved with was with already long-time community members, so I have no idea what challenges an outside company might face). Regarding making money in stores, do we want companies to do that, or rather do this ourselves, like e.g. Krita does? (I see the Krita Foundation rather as an implementation detail of "us" than a company here). > >> > > For those people who claim that having paid people work on a Free > >> > > Software > >> > > project will inevitably kill all motivation for volunteers, let's > >> > > look at > >> > > >> > > some examples within or close to KDE: > >> > We need to get clear on what we are debating. It's not that paid people > >> > are > >> > a problem. It's about how this is done and who is paying them. > > Which is why we need a lot of companies. Having only a few means each > has an outsized influence on the direction of the developers and what > direction they take the software. > > >> > We have a very conscious standing decision that KDE e.V. does not pay > >> > developers. This clearly separates paid and
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
As Cornelius has already mentioned, the debate is not about whether we want companies around the KDE community, or not. As long as we create high quality digital products, companies will always be around us. Imho, what really matters is to start discussing on what kind of company ecosystem we want around our community. Afterwards, or maybe simultaneously, we may start talking about what we could do so as to construct such an ecosystem. When I imagine this ecosystem, I see social purpose companies and not "only for profit" ones. These companies are governed by their social mission and not by their lust for profit and growth. I would be proud of a KDE "doing business" with companies that create products or provide services that fullfil social needs. Example: entrepreneurial initiatives to create privacy oriented, plasma mobile devices with long term support, made of recyclable components that users may substitute when broken. Moreover, I see generative companies that improve the KDE output, allocating resources for upstream work. Although we cannot prevent extractive companies that just consume our work for making profit from existing, I do not see them as our partners, since they do not improve our community and jeopardize its sustainability. In addition, I would like to cooperate with non hierarchical companies, where people do not work overtime to reach deadlines imposed on them by upper management. I' d really enjoy working with companies having as purpose to create livelihood for their members. And when success leads to the creation of surplus, the surplus would not be invested to financial products but it would be shared with the community, supporting KDE e.v. and more importantly, supporting similar entrepreneurial initiatives. So, this ecosystem does not consist of competitive companies. In a sustainable ecosystem the output of one is the input of the other. There should not exist companies that both create two distinct kirigami based file managers with similar features. Instead, companies that coordinate, working on different features and adding back to kirigami the components it lacks of, avoiding duplication of effort and wasting of resources, as well as reducing the environmental footprint. In the vision of KDE is mentioned: "Of course, there is much more to life than the 'digital' part. While we all want freedom and control in the other parts too, influencing that is beyond KDE's scope, so we limit our vision to 'digital life'." I believe that the creation of an ethical ecosystem that may allow contributors to make a living by working on what they really love is a huge step towards freedom. On August 24, 2018 5:12:28 PM GMT+03:00, Sune Vuorela wrote: >On 2018-08-24, Cornelius Schumacher wrote: >> This was a quite complex situation, there were many factors involved. >But >> again the negative feedback was not about the question if it's ok to >pay >> developers but about other aspects of how the project was handled. > >And on some of those questions, Frank has later said at public talks >that "KDE was right". (fosdem last year) > >/Sune -- Σταλμένο από τη συσκευή μου Android με το K-9 Mail. Παρακαλώ συγχωρήστε την ολιγολογία μου.
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On 2018-08-24, Cornelius Schumacher wrote: > This was a quite complex situation, there were many factors involved. But > again the negative feedback was not about the question if it's ok to pay > developers but about other aspects of how the project was handled. And on some of those questions, Frank has later said at public talks that "KDE was right". (fosdem last year) /Sune
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Thanks for starting this topic Valorie. Hoping I do not repeat similar observations, wanted to share one thing. Background As soon as KDE application(s) are not publicly tied to "KDE" desktop on several levels, fair rules of competition become possible. I have learned this through the history of KEXI since 2002: in years where we had strong Windows support were extraordinary regarding user feedback. The same about caring for non-Plasma desktops compatibility. "Plasma users" tend to be a minority target at least for specialized apps by definition, well that group is a minority on the Desktop itself, so how it can be otherwise? And numbers further decreased after the decline of some desktops towards touch based UIs. Boud can correct me here but Krita loks like a very good example too. As soon as an app project is known as a normal standalone app, things start to be normal. For some reasons not caused by us, KDE folks, this is not *default* state for apps. "For KDE only" has been long the default. For Qt-only app projects it is a bit easier. It's good when we attract these projects under the KDE umbrella. To compare with above examples, Calligra as a whole has not managed so far to escape the "Office suite for KDE" or older "Integrated KDE office suite" unfortunate stamps.[1][2] Well, I bet such sentences still sit in package descriptions across some distributions. Here, again even in KDE circles the #1 FOSS competing office suite is perceived as global instead of Calligra. I've not seen too much of spontaneous use of Calligra during Akademy presentations. We were close to being global in the gold Nokia and KO GmbH times (2009+) even if there was some more interest in mobile targets. And now: One challenge for the integration I would see it that "part of the KDE community" needs to be in conflict with the "go global". Application contributors need not to worry that their attempt to "go global" is not the preferred choice within the KDE family. [1] I do not see this much different from Microsofts' behavior of promoting apps "running best on its operating system". [2] Just unfortunate messaging since at technology level we have no such problems. We stay on top of extremely portable Qt, CMake and KF5 technologies, paired with great multi-OS KDE CI infra. As it's worth mentioning the KF5 prject realizes its road to "global" just very well IMO. On Sat, 11 Aug 2018 at 12:35, Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > Hello folks, I've recently spent a week with Boud and Irina Rempt at > their invitation. I hope that this sort of generous hospitality > becomes the norm in our our KDE family. While there, we had many > conversations about the past, present and future of KDE. I was > surprised to learn that during the life of KO, Boud's previous company > with Inga Wallin and now with his small company which supports Krita, > he encountered quite a bit of opposition *in the KDE community*! > > I've long been puzzled why KDE applications seem to be relegated to > the "second circle" of KDE, and companies supporting KDE software even > further out. > > Not just puzzled, but somewhat discouraged, to be honest. When I > consider the future of a healthy KDE, I see many small companies > popping up, offering commercial support and specialized applications > to users. Far too often I see our great young programmers work within > KDE for a few years, but when they find a job "outside" then pair up > and perhaps have children, they are only involved tangentially. In a > healthy ecosystem, there would numerous KDE affiliated companies > competing to hire them, and they would stay involved as long as they > wanted, while supporting themselves. > > Am I the only one who thinks of our future in this way? I think it's > great that we are improving ties with "outside" companies and groups, > and fully support that. But *inside* KDE we should be starting > companies and foundations who can collect donations to support KDE > programmers. I would like to know the thoughts of others and how we > can best encourage this. > > Please let's talk about this during Akademy. > > Valorie > > -- > http://about.me/valoriez > -- regards, Jaroslaw Staniek KDE: : A world-wide network of software engineers, artists, writers, translators : and facilitators committed to Free Software development - http://kde.org KEXI: : A visual database apps builder - http://calligra.org/kexi http://twitter.com/kexi_project https://facebook.com/kexi.project Qt Certified Specialist: : http://www.linkedin.com/in/jstaniek
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Now that I'm coming out of jetlag, catching up on email and so happy to see the direction this discussion is taking. On Thu, Aug 23, 2018 at 7:51 AM Jeremy Whiting wrote: > > Hi All, > > On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 1:29 PM Adriaan de Groot wrote: >> >> Mostly I'm repeating this item from Cornelius because it follows so well from >> what Valorie *originally* asked, rather than a bunch of misintepretations and >> discussing-something-else. >> >> On Monday, 20 August 2018 10:58:05 CEST Cornelius Schumacher wrote: >> > I don't think that anybody has a problem with having a healthy ecosystem of >> > companies around KDE. That's not the debate we are having. Slight pushback here: Boud has gotten negative feedback for having a foundation to pay devels for Krita. Frank definitely got negative feedback, enough to take ownCloud out of the KDE ecosystem. >> The thread started with Valorie exclaiming surprise that there was pushback >> on >> the entire notion of having companies / paid development around the KDE >> community. Some people have chimed in saying that that's not what they hear >> at >> all, so at this point I'm inclined to say that Valorie had the bad luck to >> run >> into one or two grumpy people. Possibly. However I've heard a lot of this over the years. It could have been the same few grumpy people though; I didn't keep track. :-) >> [Disclosure: Cornelius is presumably paid to work on Free Software-ish things >> throughout the week; I am paid to work on Free Software things for at least >> half of the week, and am looking for more.] >> > > I also work on Free Software-ish things myself, but haven't done as much KDE > stuff > in the past few years. > > >> >> But we could run a separate email thread with this question: >> >> - do we (as a community) want an ecosystem of companies and paid development >> around KDE? This was my main question, and I and most answering here seem to say YES. I believe that this growth is crucial to the on-going growth and health of the KDE community. > I would argue that whether we as a community want that or not we already have > it. I can > name on a couple of hands quickly a number of community members that either > are paid > to work directly on KDE stuff or on free software in general and do KDE stuff > in "Community" > paid time by the company they work for. And to the extent this is true, and those companies make enough money to keep paying them, this is a Good Thing. Blue Systems is great, but do they have a plan to make money? As far as I can see, it seems to be more a KDE charity. I think this is great, *and* I would like to see profit-making companies surround us as well. Not just a few, but *many* of them. Many of our applications, for instance, could be world-class, and support small companies which in turn support them. In addition, I'd like to see companies doing support for companies and individuals using KDE software on Linux, Mac and Windows. I'd like to see at least on the Windows Store many more applications making a bit of money. >> > > For those people who claim that having paid people work on a Free >> > > Software >> > > project will inevitably kill all motivation for volunteers, let's look at >> > >> > > some examples within or close to KDE: >> > We need to get clear on what we are debating. It's not that paid people are >> > a problem. It's about how this is done and who is paying them. Which is why we need a lot of companies. Having only a few means each has an outsized influence on the direction of the developers and what direction they take the software. >> > We have a very conscious standing decision that KDE e.V. does not pay >> > developers. This clearly separates paid and volunteer work there so that >> > there can be no issue with harming volunteer motivation. We might want to >> > revisit this decision but would need to be very clear about the governance >> > of this work. >> >> You're right. That's a very separate debate. That question is: >> >> - are there any circumstances under which KDE e.V. itself should fund >> development, by paying developers directly or hiring companies to do so? IMO the e.V. should be spending money to develop KDE infrastructure -- the website, both developer and user documentation, and our hardware and the sysadmins who care for it. In addition, we need Promo (which we now have, and paid and volunteer people happily work together), sprints and other meetings, which again I think could use paid staff and volunteers working together. > Yes, I think this is the real question here. We already have paid developers, > the question > is whether e.V. should get involved in that aspect. > > One possible way to remove the emotional aspect of this would be to have the > board > or some work group come up with a bounty list of long-standing issues we > would like to see > fixed and whoever (individual or group/company) is able to properly fix the > issue gets the > money for that bounty. This
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Hi All, On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 1:29 PM Adriaan de Groot wrote: > Mostly I'm repeating this item from Cornelius because it follows so well > from > what Valorie *originally* asked, rather than a bunch of misintepretations > and > discussing-something-else. > > On Monday, 20 August 2018 10:58:05 CEST Cornelius Schumacher wrote: > > I don't think that anybody has a problem with having a healthy ecosystem > of > > companies around KDE. That's not the debate we are having. > > The thread started with Valorie exclaiming surprise that there was > pushback on > the entire notion of having companies / paid development around the KDE > community. Some people have chimed in saying that that's not what they > hear at > all, so at this point I'm inclined to say that Valorie had the bad luck to > run > into one or two grumpy people. > > [Disclosure: Cornelius is presumably paid to work on Free Software-ish > things > throughout the week; I am paid to work on Free Software things for at > least > half of the week, and am looking for more.] > > I also work on Free Software-ish things myself, but haven't done as much KDE stuff in the past few years. > But we could run a separate email thread with this question: > > - do we (as a community) want an ecosystem of companies and paid > development > around KDE? > I would argue that whether we as a community want that or not we already have it. I can name on a couple of hands quickly a number of community members that either are paid to work directly on KDE stuff or on free software in general and do KDE stuff in "Community" paid time by the company they work for. > > > > > For those people who claim that having paid people work on a Free > Software > > > project will inevitably kill all motivation for volunteers, let's look > at > > > > > some examples within or close to KDE: > > We need to get clear on what we are debating. It's not that paid people > are > > a problem. It's about how this is done and who is paying them. > > > > We have a very conscious standing decision that KDE e.V. does not pay > > developers. This clearly separates paid and volunteer work there so that > > there can be no issue with harming volunteer motivation. We might want to > > revisit this decision but would need to be very clear about the > governance > > of this work. > > You're right. That's a very separate debate. That question is: > > - are there any circumstances under which KDE e.V. itself should fund > development, by paying developers directly or hiring companies to do so? > Yes, I think this is the real question here. We already have paid developers, the question is whether e.V. should get involved in that aspect. One possible way to remove the emotional aspect of this would be to have the board or some work group come up with a bounty list of long-standing issues we would like to see fixed and whoever (individual or group/company) is able to properly fix the issue gets the money for that bounty. This could be tricky for board members to stay out of the conflict of interest gray area. (e.g. Hey, Lydia created that bounty because she knew the company/ friends she works for/with could tackle it or somesuch) but with enough of a selection process of which bounties we want that could be decreased quite a bit (e.g. The whole kde ev membership voted on these bounties, no way for an individual to have influenced the bounties enough to matter). BR, Jeremy > > .. and there's a third question, raised by yourself at Akademy and touched > by > Sven just now: > > - if KDE e.V. has money, and doesn't spend it directly on development, > how > can it best support KDE development indirectly? > > > These are three distinct questions, and really we should be very very > clear on > which one we're tackling (which, thank you, you have pointed out -- as has > Sune, and others, and now I'm just repeating stuff :) ) > > [ade]
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Mostly I'm repeating this item from Cornelius because it follows so well from what Valorie *originally* asked, rather than a bunch of misintepretations and discussing-something-else. On Monday, 20 August 2018 10:58:05 CEST Cornelius Schumacher wrote: > I don't think that anybody has a problem with having a healthy ecosystem of > companies around KDE. That's not the debate we are having. The thread started with Valorie exclaiming surprise that there was pushback on the entire notion of having companies / paid development around the KDE community. Some people have chimed in saying that that's not what they hear at all, so at this point I'm inclined to say that Valorie had the bad luck to run into one or two grumpy people. [Disclosure: Cornelius is presumably paid to work on Free Software-ish things throughout the week; I am paid to work on Free Software things for at least half of the week, and am looking for more.] But we could run a separate email thread with this question: - do we (as a community) want an ecosystem of companies and paid development around KDE? > > For those people who claim that having paid people work on a Free Software > > project will inevitably kill all motivation for volunteers, let's look at > > > some examples within or close to KDE: > We need to get clear on what we are debating. It's not that paid people are > a problem. It's about how this is done and who is paying them. > > We have a very conscious standing decision that KDE e.V. does not pay > developers. This clearly separates paid and volunteer work there so that > there can be no issue with harming volunteer motivation. We might want to > revisit this decision but would need to be very clear about the governance > of this work. You're right. That's a very separate debate. That question is: - are there any circumstances under which KDE e.V. itself should fund development, by paying developers directly or hiring companies to do so? .. and there's a third question, raised by yourself at Akademy and touched by Sven just now: - if KDE e.V. has money, and doesn't spend it directly on development, how can it best support KDE development indirectly? These are three distinct questions, and really we should be very very clear on which one we're tackling (which, thank you, you have pointed out -- as has Sune, and others, and now I'm just repeating stuff :) ) [ade] signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On Monday, 20 August 2018 18:41:31 CEST Sune Vuorela wrote: > I have still to be convinced that it is a good idea that KDE eV decides > whose work is good enough to qualify for KDE money. Well, you could let the membership vote whether they trust an applicant, for instance. Or let the board decide about this, which was elected by the membership. It will be like this anyways: The e.V. as a fact has some money, and the e.V. has to decide somehow what to spend it on. If you don't trust anyone to make a decision what to do with the money, you will end up doing nothing with it, which is probably very close to the worst possible outcome. Being overly cautious usually doesn't lose, but it pretty much never wins either. Best, Sven signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On 2018-08-19, Thomas Pfeiffer wrote: > Interestingly, in almost all conversations I had at Akademy about this topic, > people were actually very positive about the prospect of growing an ecosystem > of companies around KDE. Maybe it's the difference between the people who are > still active and want to see people spend paid time on KDE, and those who are > mostly watching KDE from the sidelines and want to go back to "the good old > timeṣ"™ when KDE was just a bunch of enthusiastic geeks who wanted to change > the world as a hobby. I think this is a misinterpretation. I have not heard a single voice opposing people getting paid for doing KDE hacking. I have heard some people arguing that KDE eV shouldn't pay people to hack on KDE software. I have still to be convinced that it is a good idea that KDE eV decides whose work is good enough to qualify for KDE money. /Sune
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On Montag, 20. August 2018 00:30:37 CEST Thomas Pfeiffer wrote: > > Interestingly, in almost all conversations I had at Akademy about this > topic, people were actually very positive about the prospect of growing an > ecosystem of companies around KDE. Maybe it's the difference between the > people who are still active and want to see people spend paid time on KDE, > and those who are mostly watching KDE from the sidelines and want to go > back to "the good old timeṣ"™ when KDE was just a bunch of enthusiastic > geeks who wanted to change the world as a hobby. As one of the people who is more on the sidelines now but has seen the "good old times" I can say that I don't think what you are describing is the issue. We always had paid people working on KDE. I would even say we had more paid people in the past. The distributions were much more involved at the beginning and we had projects such as all the work around Kolab which had many paid people working on KDE full-time. I don't think that anybody has a problem with having a healthy ecosystem of companies around KDE. That's not the debate we are having. > For those people who claim that having paid people work on a Free Software > project will inevitably kill all motivation for volunteers, let's look at > some examples within or close to KDE: We need to get clear on what we are debating. It's not that paid people are a problem. It's about how this is done and who is paying them. We have a very conscious standing decision that KDE e.V. does not pay developers. This clearly separates paid and volunteer work there so that there can be no issue with harming volunteer motivation. We might want to revisit this decision but would need to be very clear about the governance of this work. In the cases where people are paid by companies we have a clear governance structure, the company decides, and it's very clear how you can get paid, by becoming hired by the company. This is much less prone to conflicts than if the organization which is mostly representing the volunteers is paying people. We have seen unsuccessful attempts in the past such as bounty programs which did more harm than good. That's something we can learn from. We also have made some experience such as with the Kolab project where a lot of good community work was done by paid people, but in the process of the project basically all volunteers turned into paid people. When the project was done this left the community with a painful lack of developers, as neither paid people nor volunteers were there anymore. We have to consider such situations as well. It would be good if we can have a rational debate about how we make best use of paid work in KDE. I have the feeling that some emotions are in the way of actually discussing the real questions. Let's put them aside for now and talk actual business. -- Cornelius Schumacher
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On Samstag, 11. August 2018 14:25:16 CEST Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > In addition there is the widespread opinion that amateurs are better > than professionals for KDE, and that if there are professionals > working on software, that the volunteers will leave. In fact, this > idea seems widespread in the FOSS world. From what I have seen, > professionals can *increase* volunteer contributions, by laying the > groundwork for successful onboarding, by paying attention to details > which volunteers left undone or did improperly, by doing work that no > volunteers have the skills or interest in doing, in ensuring that > documentation is up-to-date, by thinking of tasks such as training > sessions for bug-triage, documentation writing, packaging, testing > days and so forth. Hi Valorie, Thank you for bringing this topic up! Interestingly, in almost all conversations I had at Akademy about this topic, people were actually very positive about the prospect of growing an ecosystem of companies around KDE. Maybe it's the difference between the people who are still active and want to see people spend paid time on KDE, and those who are mostly watching KDE from the sidelines and want to go back to "the good old timeṣ"™ when KDE was just a bunch of enthusiastic geeks who wanted to change the world as a hobby. For those people who claim that having paid people work on a Free Software project will inevitably kill all motivation for volunteers, let's look at some examples within or close to KDE: 1. Plasma: If you look at the percentage of regular Plasma developers who are employed by Blue Systems, you could indeed think that nobody wants to work on it as a volunteer anymore. However, the reality is the other way around: It's not that volunteers stay clear of Plasma because it has so many paid developers, it's rather that whenever a very active Plasma contributor is looking for a job, chances are high that they get that job from Blue Systems, to be able to spend more time doing what they've been doing before as volunteers. Kai Uwe or Roman are the latest examples. In fact, as far as I know, all of the Plasma developers who work for Blue Systems have started working on Plasma as volunteers and then got hired by Blue Systems. 2. Krita: Krita has become very popular as a volunteer project, until it grew to a point where it became difficult to sustain it purely with volunteer work. The team started the Krita Foundation to raise money to pay for 1.5 (or 2.5, different sources have told me different numbers) people to work on it. It continues to grow, and I have not heard of volunteer contributions going down since then. 3. ownCloud / Nextcloud: ownCloud was envisioned as a company-driven project from early on, but always aimed to have a healthy base of volunteer contributors. However, their "open core" model with a mandatory contributor license agreement, together with a decision-making process that wasn't as open as outside contributors had hoped, resulted in the community not shaping up as envisioned. So what Frank did was fork out Nextcloud, without a CLA, fully open source and with more focus on community, but still with a paid core team. As far as I know, this has worked out exceptionally well and they now have both a commercially successful company _and_ a big, happy volunteer community. 4. Kontact: The current business client for the Kolab server is still based on Kontact, yet most of its development is currently volunteer-driven. 5. KOffice / Calligra: Their story is very complex, so much so that I wouldn't dare trying to retrace it from my limited insight into it. I'd rather leave that to the team. I'm just listing it here so that people won't think I've left it out on purpose. What I gather from these examples is that having a company involved in the development of a KDE- or KDE-related project does neither guarantee its success nor its failure. Whether it's a positive or negative influence (or both) very much depends on the way that the company engages with the community. If the company takes full control of development and only maybe accepts a small patch here and there from outside volunteers, then of course volunteer contributors will lose their motivation pretty quickly. If, however, the company makes sure that people employed by it still consider themselves as part of the community just like everybody else - which is what Blue Systems does, for example - they can happily coexist with volunteer contributors. I - this is my personal opinion, not necessarily the board's stance - fully agree with Valorie that a healthy ecosystem of companies and/or foundations around KDE, with paid contributors collaborating with KDE's volunteers, would not just be a good thing, but actually necessary for us to be able to compete with other products (be they FOSS or proprietary) that are doing the same. So what I'd like us to do, instead of cowering in fear of the dangers
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Agreed wholeheartedly, more companies doing KDE is the way to go! Cheers, Ilya. On Чт, 16 авг 2018 12:21:58 +0300 h...@kde.org wrote On 8/11/18 7:34 PM, Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > Am I the only one who thinks of our future in this way? A most hearty no! > Valorie Cheers, Eike
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On 2018 M08 13, Mon 06:08:38 CEST Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > Just to follow up: many people have talked about this topic with me at > Akademy. What I'm not seeing is a public discussion here on the > community list. Note: I deliberately did not send this to the e.V. > list because this is not strictly an e.V. matter. I do believe that > the e.V. should support and welcome companies, but NOT hire > programmers. > > I'm very frustrated to hear "but the e.V. should not hire developers" > said so often when that was not proposed. > > Can we please discuss how we can best encourage companies and > foundations to grow up within the KDE community? I believe such > companies will support our work if we in turn support them. Our young > developers will be able to look forward to working in Free software > and even to contribute to the KDE codebase and other efforts! I think that would be great. Are there realistic business models how to make (some) money by working on "KDE" software so th income stream is reliable enough to pay salaries every month ? Back in 2005 or so it seemed all that would be possible, but that bubble burst :-/ Alex
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
Just to follow up: many people have talked about this topic with me at Akademy. What I'm not seeing is a public discussion here on the community list. Note: I deliberately did not send this to the e.V. list because this is not strictly an e.V. matter. I do believe that the e.V. should support and welcome companies, but NOT hire programmers. I'm very frustrated to hear "but the e.V. should not hire developers" said so often when that was not proposed. Can we please discuss how we can best encourage companies and foundations to grow up within the KDE community? I believe such companies will support our work if we in turn support them. Our young developers will be able to look forward to working in Free software and even to contribute to the KDE codebase and other efforts! If there are other ways we can grow our community and the surrounding ecosystem we should discuss them as well. If we remain a project entirely supported by volunteers, we can't grow large enough to make an impact. I would like our work -- both volunteer and paid -- to make an impact and actually change the world for the better. This seems to be a controversial topic although I do not understand why. This seems crucial to me, so please let's hash it out. We need help to improve the usability of KDE's software and making it more accessible and user-friendly for a wider variety of users. We need help to offer users a complete software environment that helps them to protect their privacy. We need help to treamline the access for contributors, to improve our documentation, and so much else. We need to grow! Valorie On Sat, Aug 11, 2018 at 5:25 AM, Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > On Sat, Aug 11, 2018 at 4:01 AM, Gilles Caulier > wrote: >> >> 2018-08-11 12:34 GMT+02:00 Valorie Zimmerman : >>> >>> Hello folks, I've recently spent a week with Boud and Irina Rempt at >>> their invitation. I hope that this sort of generous hospitality >>> becomes the norm in our our KDE family. While there, we had many >>> conversations about the past, present and future of KDE. I was >>> surprised to learn that during the life of KO, Boud's previous company >>> with Inga Wallin and now with his small company which supports Krita, >>> he encountered quite a bit of opposition *in the KDE community*! >> >> >> Hi Valorie, >> >> What do you mean exactly by "opposition" ? >> >> Best >> >> Gilles Caulier > > Opposition in the form not of "this is how I think you could do this > better" but "what a horrible idea to pay people to support KDE > software for MONEY!" and "What, another foundation? And to pay > developers? Terrible thing." > > I was shocked to hear that such thoughts were expressed to the very > people doing the work to support KDE in a professional way. > > In addition there is the widespread opinion that amateurs are better > than professionals for KDE, and that if there are professionals > working on software, that the volunteers will leave. In fact, this > idea seems widespread in the FOSS world. From what I have seen, > professionals can *increase* volunteer contributions, by laying the > groundwork for successful onboarding, by paying attention to details > which volunteers left undone or did improperly, by doing work that no > volunteers have the skills or interest in doing, in ensuring that > documentation is up-to-date, by thinking of tasks such as training > sessions for bug-triage, documentation writing, packaging, testing > days and so forth. > > Valorie > > -- > http://about.me/valoriez -- http://about.me/valoriez
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
On Sat, Aug 11, 2018 at 4:01 AM, Gilles Caulier wrote: > > 2018-08-11 12:34 GMT+02:00 Valorie Zimmerman : >> >> Hello folks, I've recently spent a week with Boud and Irina Rempt at >> their invitation. I hope that this sort of generous hospitality >> becomes the norm in our our KDE family. While there, we had many >> conversations about the past, present and future of KDE. I was >> surprised to learn that during the life of KO, Boud's previous company >> with Inga Wallin and now with his small company which supports Krita, >> he encountered quite a bit of opposition *in the KDE community*! > > > Hi Valorie, > > What do you mean exactly by "opposition" ? > > Best > > Gilles Caulier Opposition in the form not of "this is how I think you could do this better" but "what a horrible idea to pay people to support KDE software for MONEY!" and "What, another foundation? And to pay developers? Terrible thing." I was shocked to hear that such thoughts were expressed to the very people doing the work to support KDE in a professional way. In addition there is the widespread opinion that amateurs are better than professionals for KDE, and that if there are professionals working on software, that the volunteers will leave. In fact, this idea seems widespread in the FOSS world. From what I have seen, professionals can *increase* volunteer contributions, by laying the groundwork for successful onboarding, by paying attention to details which volunteers left undone or did improperly, by doing work that no volunteers have the skills or interest in doing, in ensuring that documentation is up-to-date, by thinking of tasks such as training sessions for bug-triage, documentation writing, packaging, testing days and so forth. Valorie -- http://about.me/valoriez
Re: Improving our integration with KDE application teams, and supporting companies
2018-08-11 12:34 GMT+02:00 Valorie Zimmerman : > Hello folks, I've recently spent a week with Boud and Irina Rempt at > their invitation. I hope that this sort of generous hospitality > becomes the norm in our our KDE family. While there, we had many > conversations about the past, present and future of KDE. I was > surprised to learn that during the life of KO, Boud's previous company > with Inga Wallin and now with his small company which supports Krita, > he encountered quite a bit of opposition *in the KDE community*! > Hi Valorie, What do you mean exactly by "opposition" ? Best Gilles Caulier
