Corporate Influence on Open Source

Mário discusses corporations' mixed impacts: contributions, capture risks, and the need for neutral funding structures.

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Episode notes

Guest

Mário Havel

Panelists

Eriol Fox | Victory Brown

Show Notes

In this episode of Sustain, host Eriol Fox and co-host Victory Brown are live at Devconnect Conference in Buenos Aires, with Mário Havel, protocol support at the Ethereum Foundation and co-founder of the Bordel Hackerspace in Prague. Mário shares his experience working in protocol support, contributing to the evolution and scalability of Ethereum. He dives into the significance of the Hackerspace 'Bordell' in Prague, discussing its role in fostering a creative and collaborative community focused on free and open source software. Mário also highlights the philosophical underpinnings of free software, emphasizing user freedom and security, and discusses the impact of corporate involvement in open source projects, the complexities of sustaining such initiatives, and the innovative “crowd-loaning” model used to fund their Hackerspace through Ethereum. Hit download now to hear more!

[00:00:40] Mário explains working at the Ethereum Foundation, his role on the protocol support team, the Ethereum Protocol Fellowship, and he introduces Bordel Hackerspace as a community space for hackers, makers, and artists.

[00:04:08] He elaborates on the Hackerspace which is explicitly free and open source software users and contributors and his free and open source software philosophy. Eriol reflects on her own journey learning what “free” really means in this context.

[00:07:54] Mário dives into how scalability, security, and new devs/fellowships link directly to sustainability.

[00:12:48] Mário discusses corporate influence on free/open source. He emphasizes the need for more neutral, community driven structures so projects can accept money without losing independence.

[00:15:25] Eriol contrasts joyful, playful hacker culture with the pressure many projects feel to “look corporate” to survive. Mário shares his personal stance: he avoids proprietary software and doesn’t use banks or KYC, preferring free/open monetary systems like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Monero.

[00:17:41] Mário details “crowdloaning” smart contracts they built on Ethereum. Eriol suggests many open source projects doing individual donation drives could learn from this crowdloaning model.

[00:21:10] Find out where you can follow Mário and the projects on the internet, and he spotlights the project GrapheneOS, a highly secure, privacy-respecting, easy-to-use mobile operating system.