

Sustain
SustainOSS
Sustain brings together practitioners, sustainers, funders, researchers and maintainers of the open source ecosystem. We have conversations about the health and sustainability of the open source community. We learn about the ins and outs of what ‘open source’ entails in the real world. Open source means so much more than a license; we're interested in talking about how to make sure that the culture of open source continues, grows, and ultimately, sustains itself.
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Newsletter
Episodes
Mentioned books

Feb 4, 2022 • 38min
Episode 107: Caroline Sinders on building healthy OSS Communities
Guest
Caroline Sinders
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Eriol Fox | Ben Nickolls
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. Today, we are very excited to have as our guest, Caroline Sinders, who is the Founder of Convocation Design + Research. She’s also a critical designer, researcher, and artist, and a lot of the work she does is on online gender-based violence, as well as community health and toxicity. She has a lot of expertise looking at what Codes of Conduct mean, how to have safe communities, and how to understand how to code together better. Caroline details her journey and how she got into this line of work, and how she understands the boundaries of communities, what she observes in the open source communities, and how platforms influence communities. Also, she tells us about a great toolkit she read and some great resources you can check out if you’re new to dealing with Code of Conduct. Go ahead and download this episode to learn more!
[00:02:44] Caroline explains how she started getting into this line of work.
[00:07:08] As an ethnographer, we find out how Caroline understands the boundaries of communities and how she looks at them as building spaces of shared values.
[00:13:17] Eriol wants to know things that Caroline sees happening in the spaces she observes, especially within open source communities, and why she thinks this happens in these communities.
[00:19:18] Ben wonders how Caroline feels about the influence that a platform has on communities, appreciation, and values of skill sets within that community.
[00:23:34] Eriol wonders if Caroline has encountered any communities that are very resistant to code of conduct being implemented. Also, Caroline talks about an interesting toolkit she read called, Toolkit for Cooperative, Collective, & Collaborative Cultural Work.
[00:31:36] Caroline shares some great resources that are worth checking out if you’re new to dealing with Code of Conduct.
[00:33:29] Find out where to follow Caroline on the web.
Quotes
[00:22:54] “ I think we’re stuck in a place where community worth for a community member is how many lines of code you’ve written and maybe not how many successful events have you run, how many facilitation trainings have you gone through, how any harassment teams have you helped serve spun up a guide, and those are the skills we need.”
[00:25:18] “Community doesn’t mean friendship.”
[00:25:21] “Just because you’re a small group of people that doesn’t mean you aren’t going to have a problem, it just means you haven’t had one yet.”
Spotlight
[00:34:45] Eriol’s spotlight is a talk by Kiran-Rin Oliver: Community Repositories- Why You Need One Your Open Source Project.
[00:35:25] Ben’s spotlight is a project called OpenAstroTech.
[00:36:04] Richard’s spotlight is Christmas Bird Counts.
[00:36:41] Caroline’s spotlights are the Toolkit for Cooperative, Collective, & Collaborative Cultural Work, and a shout out to her friends for celebrating their 10th Anniversary of pie hard, where they ate pie and watched Die Hard during the holiday season.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Digital Infrastructure Podcast
Digital Infrastructure Podcast-Episode 7: Caroline Sinders on the Importance of Diverse Communities
Caroline Sinders Twitter
Caroline Sinders Website
Toolkit for Cooperative, Collective, & Collaborative Cultural Work
How to Respond to Code of Conduct Reports by Valerie Aurora
Community Repositories- Why You Need One Your Open Source Project (YouTube)
OpenAstroTech
Audubon Christmas Bird Count
Die Hard
“What Does a Community Need?” Researching Remote Communities, Digital Events, Academic Conferences, and Tool Design during COVID19 by Caroline Sinders, Melina Garcia, and Melissa Huerta (Simply Secure)
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Caroline Sinders.Support Sustain

Jan 28, 2022 • 36min
Episode 106: Rodrigo Mendoza on Quine and GitNFT
Guest
Rodrigo Mendoza
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Justin Dorfman | Ben Nichols | Eric Berry
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. Today, we have a really awesome guest to talk about some really cool stuff. Rodrigo Mendoza is the Founder and CEO of Quine, a data-driven professional network for software creators, as well as GitNFT, an NFT minting platform for GitHub commits. Rodrigo dives deep in Quine and tells us why he’s focusing on open source and software developers, and what is so different about his platform. We also learn more about GitNFT, which is a part of Quine but a different product, and he talks about some of the issues he’s had with GitNFT and why some people get so riled up towards NFTs and Web3. Go ahead and download this episode now to find out much more!
[00:02:09] We start off with Rodrigo telling us what Quine is.
[00:04:12] Richard wonders why Rodrigo is focusing on open source and software developers in particular.
[00:05:26] Richard asks Rodrigo how Quine is not a subset of LinkedIn, and he tells us what’s different about his platform.
[00:09:17] Ben wonders if Rodrigo has any pathways he could create to bring more people into open source to distribute more opportunities to people.
[00:12:33] Another thing Rodrigo works on is GitNFT, so we find out more about that and how it works.
[00:16:22] Justin asks Rodrigo his thoughts on why some people in this industry or our community are so hostile towards NFTs and Web3 as a whole.
[00:21:28] Richard wonders how Rodrigo deals with the internal conflict.
[00:23:36] Ben shares his thoughts on NFTs, and Rodrigo talks about some of the issues he’s had with GitNFT.
[00:29:17] Eric shares some closing thoughts on GitNFT, NFTs overall, and what he loves about this project.
[00:32:35] Find out where you can follow Rodrigo and learn more about Quine.
Quotes
[00:02:28] “We think that coding is a super-power and if you can code, then you should be able to monetize your skill in a way that is very easy and very fluid.”
[00:06:48] “We think of open source as the professional network of the future.”
[00:07:21] “We think that open source contributions are going to be micro-certificates of skill.”
[00:08:35] “Open source contributions are proof-of-work for skills.”
[00:10:07] “I like to think that open source is still in its early stages.”
[00:11:09] “Open Source has the same problems that a creator economy has: It has issues all around attention, monetization, content creation, content consumption, etc.”
[00:15:40] “We think that having an NFT of a commit can have value based on historical significance.”
[00:19:44] “We want to flip the script on how we monetize open source contributions.”
Spotlight
[00:33:33] Ben’s spotlight is Exercism.org.
[00:34:07] Eric’s spotlight is the Firefox Browser Developer Edition.
[00:34:27] Justin’s spotlight is a GitNFT discussion on the Sustain discourse.
[00:34:45] Richard’s spotlight is ADHD medication.
[00:35:16] Rodrigo’s spotlight is Bioconductor.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Rodrigo Mendoza Twitter
Rodrigo Mendoza LinkedIn
Quine
Quine Twitter
GitNFT
GitNFT Twitter
“Devs have eaten the world,” by Rodrigo Mendoza
Exercism
Firefox Browser Developer Edition
Sustain Discourse-GitNFT discussion
Bioconductor
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Rodrigo Mendoza-Smith.Support Sustain

Jan 21, 2022 • 41min
Episode 105: John Amaral and Kyle Quest on Slim.ai
Guest
John Amaral | Kyle Quest
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Eric Berry
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. Today, we are excited to have two guests with us from Slim.ai, which is a company that focuses on developer experience. Joining us is John Amaral, who is the CEO of Slim.ai and Kyle Quest, who is the CTO of Slim.ai and creator of DockerSlim. We are going to learn all about Slim.ai, who is using it, tools they are building, and why Kyle created DockerSlim. Also, John and Kyle fill us in what they’re doing to give back to the communities and why they have the best developer focused investors. Go ahead and download this episode now to find out much more!
[00:02:24] John tells us what Slim.ai does.
[00:04:10] Kyle expands on the ‘ai’ part of it which stands for “Application Intelligence,” and what aspects he would go in and modify.
[00:08:22] We learn who is primarily using Slim.ai. and the tools they are building.
[00:10:53] Kyle fills us in more about the governance of DockerSlim, how he ended up having more contributors contribute to it, and how it maintains itself as a free project with all the work he’s putting in. Also, he mentions Gitpod as a great tool.
[00:14:31] John tells us how they are paying themselves and their developers.
[00:19:46] Eric asks Kyle and John if they see a shift in the community to where there is more attention and new avenues that containerization is providing, and if they see the developer environment of the future primarily being in the Cloud.
[00:24:03] When Richard thinks of the Cloud he thinks of large business practices, which are interested in paying other large projects to host their stuff, and he asks Kyle to share his thoughts on this.
[00:26:15] We hear how John and Kyle are maintaining their core value of helping developers do better and their amazing investment partners.
[00:29:01] Kyle and John explain what they’re doing to give back to the communities.
[00:36:03] Find out where you can follow along with Slim.ai, John, and Kyle and get involved with their communities.
Quotes
[00:11:42] “There are many ways to contribute: It’s not just about code, it’s about feedback, ideas, and suggestions.”
[00:14:52] “We believe in open source as a foundational way to build value with developers.”
[00:15:06] “We work in a way that is designed around interacting and giving to developers.”
Spotlight
[00:37:02] Eric’s spotlight is Lazydocker built by Jessie Duffield.
[00:37:29] Richard’s spotlight is Pieter van Noordennen.
[00:38:21] John’s spotlight is Railway.app.
[00:39:25] Kyle’s spotlight is Docker.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
John Amaral Twitter
John Amaral Linkedin
Kyle Quest Twitter
Kyle Quest GitHub
Slim.ai
DockerSlim
Gitpod
Sustain Podcast-Episode 85: Geoffrey Huntley and Sustaining OSS with Gitpod
boldstart
Sustain Podcast- 2 Episodes with Dave Gandy
Lazydocker-GitHub
Pieter van Noordennen Linkedin
Railway.app
Docker
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guests: John Amaral and Kyle Quest.Support Sustain

Jan 14, 2022 • 40min
Episode 104: Duane O’Brien and Mandy Grover on Investing in Open Source: The FOSS Contributor Fund
Guest
Duane O’Brien | Mandy Grover
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Justin Dorfman | Ben Nichols
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. On today’s episode we have two excellent guests, Duane O’Brien and Mandy Grover. Duane is the Head of Open Source at Indeed and Mandy is a Technical Content Architect III, as well as manages a team within the Technical Content organization at Indeed. They are here to talk about the FOSS Fund and the recently released FOSS Fund report. Duane and Mandy go in detail on the report and expand on who it is for, how to use it, tools they used, and things they’ll be writing about in the second report. We also learn the ups and downs of writing, but more importantly how Duane and Mandy built their friendship and trust in the process of writing this report successfully. Go ahead and download this episode now to learn more!
[00:03:11] Mandy and Duane fill us in on the FOSS Fund report titled, Investing in Open Source: The FOSS Contributor Fund.
[00:04:57] We learn more about how the FOSS Contributor Fund started, what it is, and how the response has been so far.
[00:09:06] Justin wonders if Duane and Mandy ever thought this would become the blueprint, and then we hear the story how the Sentry thing came about.
[00:16:08] Learn about some new things coming out in the second report.
[00:19:24] Duane explains how you can still use this report even if your organization is not huge.
[00:20:56] Richard wonders if you were a coder, how could you make yourself more eligible to be a recipient of funds.
[00:24:19] Find out about a few of the tools they talk about in the report, one which is called Starfish.
[00:26:28] Mandy fills us in on how everything went when they released the report and how they set expectations with each other. Duane also brings up about asking maintainers to write things.
[00:33:54] Find out where you can find this report and where you can find Duane and Mandy online.
Quotes
[00:13:56] “We had this moment where we were like, it’s certainly projects, it’s certainly money, it’s certainly all these things, but at the heart of it is people.”
[00:21:17] “The biggest problem that we don’t talk about is this: You are a single project in a sea of thousands that organizations may depend on.”
[00:26:48] “We set expectations early, we knew the goal, and we were always there supporting each other and holding each other accountable.”
[00:33:12] “Let’s temper our expectation of what we want maintainers to do when it comes to documenting things because it’s not easy.”
Spotlight
[00:35:15] Justin’s spotlight is Opensourcestories.org.
[00:35:35] Ben’s spotlights are 24 Pull Requests and The Good Docs Project.
[00:36:37] Richard’s spotlight is John Hill.
[00:37:08] Mandy’s spotlight is to watch all movies.
[00:38:29] Duane’s spotlight is the book, A Psalm for the Wild- Built by Becky Chambers.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Duane O’Brien Twitter
Duane O’Brien Linkedin
Mandy Grover Twitter
Mandy Grover Twitter (Indeed)
Mandy Grover Linkedin
Indeed Open Source
Investing in Open Source: The FOSS Contributor Fund-(EBOOK)
Sustain Podcast-Episode 80: Emma Irwin and the FOSS Fund Program
Sustain Podcast-Episode 96: Chad Whitacre and how Sentry is giving $150k to their OSS Dependencies
Sustain Podcast- Episode 38: Working Group Updates with Justin & Javi
Sustain Podcast-Episode 101: Nicholas Zakas and ESLint
FOSS Contributor Fund
Starfish-GitHub
Open Source Stories
24 Pull Requests
The Good Docs Project
John Hill
John Hill Twitter
Sunset Blvd
All the President’s Men
David Lynch movies
A Psalm for the Wild-Built (Monk & Robot #1) by Becky Chambers
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guests: Duane O’Brien and Mandy Grover.Support Sustain

Jan 7, 2022 • 30min
Episode 103: Samuel Wein on OpenMS and Mass Spectrometry
Guest
Samuel Wein
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Justin Dorfman
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. On today’s episode, we are very excited to have as our guest, Samuel Wein, who is a core developer and Executive Chairman of the OpenMS Foundation, a Post Doc at University of Tuebingen in Germany, and the head of a software consultancy specializing in analysis of RNA using Mass Spectrometry. Samuel fills us in on OpenMS and Mass Spectrometry and how he’s trying to make it better and expand it. He explains more about the governance process, how the funding process is going, training programs he’s done, and an internship program in the works to get more diversity. Samuel shares some great groups to get involved in the open source projects sciences area, and what he would like to change with OpenMS. Go ahead and download this episode now to find out more!
[00:02:14] Samuel is a scientist, so we find out how he ended up being a coder.
[00:03:27] Samuel explains OpenMS and Mass Spectrometry, and Justin wonders if this was instrumental in the mRNA research from Moderna and the other place that Pfizer teamed up with.
[00:06:47] Justin wonders how many times Samuel has been trying to get recruited from companies, such as Moderna, since they are probably looking for people like Samuel, and what’s keeping him away from them.
[00:08:14] Richard wonders what the governance process was like.
[00:11:09] Samuel has three partnerships for funding right now and Justin wonders if they are his go-to or if he needs to get more funding from different partners.
[00:13:08] Richard asks Samuel if he can talk about how he’s keeping the project from ending up bending the corporate interest and what it looks like for him.
[00:14:29] Justin wonders what other revenue streams Samuel has besides his donors and grants and if he has any training programs that he’s put together.
[00:17:34] Besides documentation, Richard is curious to know if Samuel could think of looking at his organization and then the wider field as a whole of really improving JEDI work, and if there’s anything he’s working on besides that.
[00:20:00] Samuel explains how people can get involved and what was helpful for him.
[00:22:17] We find out what Samuel is interested in learning and changing, as well as other things he’s interested in doing with OpenMS.
[00:24:07] Samuel suggests some groups that have useful to him to join, such as Open Bio, EuBIC-MS, and HUPO PSI.
[00:25:45] Find out where you can follow Samuel on the internet.
Quotes
[00:08:19] “My experience with scientific projects developed in labs is that they unfortunately tend to have a lifecycle that is contingent upon the career path of the core developer.”
[00:08:45] "There are issues with sustainability and maintainability once the original developer has left.”
[00:09:39] “[On community organizing in OSS] It’s all volunteer, it’s all passion projects, and you need to steer people towards their passions.”
[00:16:20] “We’re looking for a Community Manager.”
[00:22:41] “I would like to convince more scientists of the importance of choosing their software based on it’s openness.”
Spotlight
[00:27:23] Justin’s spotlight is BioJS.
[00:27:56] Richard’s spotlight is _The Wheel of Time _books by Robert Jordan.
[00:28:45] Samuel's spotlight is Anathem by Neal Stephenson.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Samuel Wein PhD Linkedin
Samuel Wein GitHub
OpenMS
sam@samwein.com
Otakon
Open Bioinformatics Foundation
EuBIC-MS (European Bioinformatics Community for Mass Spectrometry)
HUPO-PSI (HUPO Proteomics Standards Initiative)
BioJs
The Eye of the World: Book One of The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan
Anathem by Neal Stephenson
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Samuel Wein.Support Sustain

Dec 17, 2021 • 40min
Episode 102: Ele Diakomichalis and Radicle
Guest
Ele Diakomichalis
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Eric Berry | Pia Mancini
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. We are very excited to have as our guest today, Ele Diakomichalis, who is one of the Co-Founders and one of the core contributors to Radicle. What is Radicle? It’s a decentralized stack for code collaboration that enables developers to collaborate on code, govern code, and fund code in a decentralized way. Ele fills us in more about Radicle, how many people are on the team, how many people use it, the financial commitment to using Radicle, and he explains the three layers to the Radicle stack. Also, we find out Ele’s pipe dream for long-term usage of Radicle and his thoughts on how he thinks he can change the coding space for JavaScript and Ruby coders, and people who want to make open source better. Go ahead and download this episode now to find out more about how to get involved in Radicle!
[00:01:28] Ele fills us in on what Radicle is and why it’s so awesome. Also, we learn how Radicle is different than using GitHub and then paying people through Open Collective using Ethereum.
[00:08:39] We learn more about the financial commitment that somebody using Radicle might be obligated to or not obligated to.
[00:15:29] Richard wonders what the current scope of Radicle is, how many people use it, and how big the team is.
[00:18:09] What is Ele’s pipe dream for long-term usage of Radicle for the average contributor who doesn’t want anything to do with P2P or Crypto, and how does he think he can change the coding space for JavaScript coders, Ruby coders, or people who are interested in just making open source better and working on stuff?
[00:22:42] The topic of finding a path for open source creators to capture more value out of their creations through a coin or token is brought up by Pia and she wonders how that’s looking now for Ele with Radicle, as well as challenges of paying or getting paid for value creation in open source.
[00:32:12] If you want to get involved in Radicle find out where you can go.
[00:33:25] Find out where you can follow Ele online.
Quotes
[00:06:25] “One of the things that we actually do with Radicle is actually leveraging Ethereum for code governance.”
[00:13:28] “The last thing is basically what we call Radicle Funding, and this is basically our contribution to the open sustainability problem where you, as a maintainer, you can actually raise funds from your supporters, either as donations or in exchange for something within your community.”
[00:19:17] “The second thing that it’s more of a dream or a hope, but I really feel that what we’re doing with Radicle works is introducing a non-hierarchical model for collaboration.”
[00:19:57] “We really hope that we’re going to see a lot of these developers actually realizing that if we can also coordinate in a non-hierarchical way and sometimes this actually looks more beautiful.”
[00:30:56] “Because we think that we need to create new cultural norms. We want to make this a norm that every time that you get paid, more developers get paid and try to create this more cyclical, regenerative, someone would say, open source economy.”
Spotlight
[00:34:31] Eric’s spotlights are iPad mini 6, Gitcoin and Kevin Owocki, and the immense value that Richard Littauer provides to the community, as well as his videos to check out on YouTube called, “Francis Bacon and Eggs.”
[00:36:09] Pia’s spotlight is the Lex Fridman Podcast.
[00:36:50] Richard’s spotlight is Nassar Hayat.
[00:37:29] Ele’s spotlights are Abbey Titcomb, Nassar Hayat, IPFS, SSB, and other decentralized workers.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Eleftherios Diakomichalis Twitter
Eleftherios Diakomichalis Linkedin
Elefttherios Diakomichalis Website
Radicle
Radicle Community
iPad mini
Kevin Owocki Twitter
Francis Bacon and Eggs-Richard Littauer (YouTube)
Lex Fridman Podcast
Nassar Hayat Twitter
Abbey Titcomb Twitter
IPFS
Sustain Podcast- Episode 57-Mikeal Rogers on Building Communities, the Early Days of Node.js, and How to Stay a Coder for Life
Sustain Podcast- Episode 56-Dominic Tarr on Coding What You Want, Living On A Boat, and the Early Days of Node.js
Sustain Podcast- Episode 68- Kevin Owocki-Introducing FundOSS.org: A new way of funding open source, by Gitcoin x Sustain
Sustain Podcast- Episode 50- Kevin Owocki- Gitcoin, Quadratic Funding, and how Crypto can sustain Open Source
Sustain Podcast- Episode 14-Kevin Owocki- Funding Open Source With Gitcoin
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Ele Diakomichalis.Support Sustain

Dec 10, 2021 • 43min
Episode 101: Nicholas Zakas and ESLint
Guest
Nicholas C. Zakas
Panelists
Richard Littauer
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. You may know my guest today, Nicholas Zakas, because he is the creator of a very popular JavaScript project called ESLint, which has been downloaded 13 million times each week. Nicholas is an independent software engineer, consultant, and coach, and has written numerous books including, Understanding ECMAScript 6, The Principles of Object-Oriented JavaScript, and Maintainable JavaScript. With over sixteen years of web application development experience and speaking at conferences around the world, he’s putting his focus now on mentoring and coaching the next generation of JavaScript engineers. Nicholas brings us on his journey sharing his story of becoming a developer, starting ESLint, and what he’s doing to make sure everybody in the ESLint community is able to benefit from the money they are bringing in. We also learn more about an interesting blog post he wrote, how contributors get paid, and other open source projects ESLint donates to. Why should you use ESLint? Go ahead and download this episode now to find out!
[00:01:39] Nicholas shares his story with us starting out as a developer and how it led him to starting ESLint.
[00:03:01] What did Nicholas mean when he said he fell in love with JavaScript?
[00:03:47] We find out how long ESLint has been around, how many people are working full-time, and how he keeps himself in funds.
[00:05:04] Nicholas talks about the Open Collective and GitHub sponsors they set up for donations.
[00:07:42] Richard brings up a blog post Nicholas wrote on, “How to talk to your company about sponsoring an open source project” and he tells us what iterations he’s gone through with ESLint.
[00:10:59] Nicholas talks about the difficulties in multi-tasking, and he tells us the next thing they tried with paying a straight per hour rate for team members.
[00:17:15] Richard wonders where Nicholas came up with the less than standard rate for hourly work which is not really a Silicon Valley salary, and he also tells us how many hours per month he is paying out and for the people that have been paid, how they feel about it, and having no caps on what people can make.
[00:20:43] Nicholas mentions using Tidelift, how much money it brings in, and the money going to TSC members.
[00:22:04] Find out what else Nicholas is doing with the money besides paying contributors. He mentions several other open source projects they are donating to, and one person in particular he mentions is Sindre Sorhus.
[00:27:58] Richard wonders more about the governance process and how Nicholas feels about it.
[00:31:52] Nicholas dives deep as he explains three things that would convince him that ESLint would be a project that he would want to use.
[00:34:20] We learn some future plans for what Nicholas would do with funds to make the project more sustainable.
[00:38:09] Find out where you follow Nicholas online.
Quotes
[00:03:26] “And I see ESLint as really, this will sound cheesy, as an act of love on your code that we aren’t trying to change what it does.”
[00:04:24] “We found that people who have kids are looking for something to do after the kids go to bed.”
[00:05:52] “And so, if that is your starting point where even folks who are just coming right out of college are getting 120k each year, that means that’s the minimum that you need to raise in order to hire someone full-time if they’re in a major metropolitan area in the United States.”
[00:22:17] “The first thing is we have what’s called a contributor pool, which is money that we set aside every month to pay non-team members for contributions to ESLint.”
[00:22:46] “Generally, anything that is of benefit to the project we will potentially pay you for.”
[00:24:43] “So, one of the things that we were looking at in terms of sustainability is we’re bringing in a certain amount of money each month.”
[00:24:53] “We are building on top of the work of others. And so, why shouldn’t we be spreading that money to those others, because without them ESLint either wouldn’t exist or be a lot harder to maintain.”
[00:28:17] “Well, what’s interesting is that when I started ESLint, in my mind this was like a one-year project.”
[00:29:16] “And I just kept coming back to, what’s in it for them?”
[00:30:44] “And so, how can I ensure the future survival of the project outside of me working on it?”
Spotlight
[00:38:52] Richard’s spotlight is StandardJS.
[00:39:27] Nicholas’s spotlight is a project called Release Please.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Nicholas C. Zakas Twitter
Human Who Codes
Open Collective- ESLint
How to talk to your company about sponsoring an open source project by Nicholas C. Zakas- Human Who Codes
Reading List-Human Who Codes
Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport
A year of paying contributors (ESLint)
Sindre Sorhus
ESLint
Standard JS-GitHub
Release Please-GitHib
Understanding ECMAScript 6: The Definitive Guide for JavaScript Developers by Nicholas C. Zakas
The Principles of Object-Oriented JavaScript by Nicholas C. Zakas
Maintainable JavaScript: Writing Readable Code by Nicholas C. Zakas
Credits
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Nicholas Zakas.Support Sustain

Dec 3, 2021 • 37min
Episode 100: Sustain #100: Only Hosts, on who we are, where we came from, and where we're going
Guest
Paul Bahr | DeAnn Bahr
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Allen “Gunner” Gunn | Eric Berry | Justin Dorfman | Pia Mancini | Eriol Fox | Ben Nichols
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. Cue the horns and balloons folks because today’s episode is extremely special. We are celebrating our 100th episode!! Can you believe it? We are so fortunate to have everyone with us, including our editors, as our conversations takes us back to the origins of this podcast and how it all began. We find out a little bit more about each panelist, and thoughts about the future of Sustain and plans going forward. The topic of having more controversy on this podcast is discussed, and thoughts on how each panelist sees the impact this podcast has made on open source sustainability and whether or not we can measure it. Go ahead and download this episode now to hear more and thank you for celebrating this momentous event with us!
[00:00:58] We start by getting to know the background of each panelist, where they work, and what they do.
[00:08:25] Since Richard always states in the beginning of every episode, “Where are we going,” Paul asks where Sustain is going as an organization and if they have any future plans.
[00:13:49] Eriol shares some thoughts with us about the future of Sustain Open Source Design.
[00:16:12] Richard brings up wishing there was more controversy on the Sustain podcast and the panelists share more.
[00:21:07] Pia talks about some things going back to the origins of this podcast.
[00:23:40] We hear from everyone on how they see the impact that this podcast has made on open source sustainability, and if they think we can measure open source sustainability.
Quotes
[00:15:24] “I really do think that the time for design as a topic within open source has never been more rich, involved, and interesting because of the amount of designers understanding what open source is in all of its different flavors and varieties. And, wanting to participate in new ways or old ways or different ways and doing a lot of really interesting stuff lately. So, I really do think it’s really a special time for designers in open source from what I can tell.”
Spotlight
[00:32:37] Gunner’s spotlight is OpenNews.
[00:33:02] Paul’s spotlight is Descript.
[00:33:42] Eric’s spotlight is Firefox.
[00:34:04] Justin’s spotlight is Gregor Martynus.
[00:34:20] Ben’s spotlight is The National Museum of Computing.
[00:35:07] Pia’s spotlight is SMAT (Social Media Analysis Toolkit).
[00:35:38] Richard’s spotlight is “Bird Facts with Richard Littauer.”
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Ford Foundation
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
Committing To Cloud Native Podcast
Reblaze
Curiefense
Sustain our Docs (Pilot Episode)
Sustain Open Source Design Podcast
Open Collective
OpenNews
Descript-GitHub
Firefox
Gregor Martynus GitHub
Light Years Ahead | The 1969 Apollo Guidance Computer-YouTube
Social Media Analysis Toolkit (SMAT)
All About Birds-Cooper’s Hawk
Credits
Produced by (Richard Littauer)
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at (Peachtree Sound)
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr (Peachtree Sound)
Special Guest: Paul and DeAnn Bahr.Support Sustain

Nov 26, 2021 • 34min
Episode 99: Matt Mankins and giving Kudos to OSS maintainers
Guest
Matt Mankins
Panelists
Richard Littauer | Ben Nichols
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. Today, we are very excited to have as our guest, Matt Mankins, joining us from Barcelona. He is a Fellow at Mozilla, currently working on advancing open monetization strategies for the web. He previously worked at the publisher Condé Nast, where he led global monetization engineering efforts for the company’s iconic brands and was the CTO of FastCo magazine. He’s also the Founder of numerous companies such as Lorem Ipsum Books, SMTP.com, Vert, and Fair Tread. On this episode, Matt fills us in on his journey as a Fellow at Mozilla and his ideas about alternative ways to fund the web, which led him to the idea of Kudos, that came out of thinking about payments. We learn what his main goal is right now with Kudos, the hardest problem he’s facing as he develops Kudos, and what he’s trying to accomplish before his Fellowship ends. Also, find out what Matt means when he said, “Kudos are about the creation, not the creator.”
Go ahead and download this episode now to find out much more!
[00:02:20] Matt fills us in on the history of the Lorem Ipsum Bookstore.
[00:03:57] We learn what Matt is doing at Mozilla and he explains Interledger.
[00:07:00] Matt describes what Kudos is and how it works, since that is the main thing he is working on now.
[00:12:50] Matt explains how Kudos is in the philosophy stage right now and the implementation is up to the various people that implement this.
[00:15:22] Flattr is brought up in conversation, and Matt explains something he did called “in-a-moon.”
[00:17:27] Richard wonders how Matt sells this to companies and how does he get them involved in wanting to invest in Kudos, and Matt shares a goal he has right now.
[00:20:02] Matt shares what he thinks is the hardest problem he’s facing right now as he develops Kudos.
[00:21:52] Ben wonders if Matt is looking for particular communities that might be interested in experimenting and Matt shares a dream of his with us.
[00:24:09] We find out how Matt is working with the Mozilla communities and how he’s about to be in the “build it phase” and the “promote it a little bit more phase.” He also tells us something he’s hoping to do in the implementation phase with Facebook and Kudos.
[00:30:44] Find out where you can follow Matt and his work online.
Quotes
[00:11:31] “In my mind, this is not just supporting Babel or Henry, but you’re supporting all of the contributors that could number in the thousands or tens of thousands.”
[00:22:21] “One of my dreams is that, as a creator, I can just go do my creation and money will show up in my bank account as I do good work to society.”
Spotlight
[00:31:11] Ben’s spotlight is Open PHD Guiding.
[00:31:56] Richard’s spotlight is the Scottish Rail System.
[00:32:43] Matt’s spotlight is a GitHub project called libfood.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Matt Mankins Twitter
Matt Mankins Blog
Matt Mankins Linkedin
Babel
JWT
Interledger Foundation
In-a-Moon Overview by Matt Mankins
Flattr
The Hacker Milieu as Gift Culture
Open PHD Guiding
ScotRail (Scotland’s Railway)
libfood-GitHub
Flossbank
The Digital Infrastructure Fund Podcast Hosted By Richard Littauer
The Faithful-The King, The Pope, The Princess- Laemmle Theatres
Sustain Podcast-Episode 96-Chad Whitacre and how Sentry is giving $150k to their OSS Dependencies
Credits
Produced by [Richard Littauer] (https://www.burntfen.com/)
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at [Peachtree Sound] (https://www.peachtreesound.com/)
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr [Peachtree Sound] (https://www.peachtreesound.com/)
Special Guest: Matt Mankins.Support Sustain

Nov 19, 2021 • 37min
Episode 98: Silona Bonewald and her long-term vision for IEEE and open source
Guest
Silona Bonewald
Panelists
Richard Littauer
Show Notes
Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. Today, our guest is Silona Bonewald, who is the Executive Director of IEEE SA OPEN, which is a comprehensive platform offering the open source community cost-effective options for developing and validating their projects. She is also the Founder of Leadingbit Solutions. We find out why Silona was a taker, not a maker, when she first got into open source, how she went from writing code to working on policy, how she ended up at IEEE, and what SA OPEN does. She reveals her long-term vision for IEEE and open source, how she feels about standards using her Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups metaphor, working on certifications, and she shares her thoughts on where she thinks we will be down the road in the distant future in terms of badges and certification for open source. Go ahead and download this episode to learn much more from Silona!
[00:01:30] Silona tells us how she was a taker, not a maker, when she first got into open source.
[00:05:20] At some point Silona segued from writing code to working on policy and she tells us how that happened.
[00:06:53] We find out how Silona ended up at IEEE and what SA OPEN does.
[00:09:08] Silona talks about her long-term vision for both IEEE and open source.
[00:11:30] Standards are explained by Silona, how they work, why they think in decades, and who the 30,000 people are involved with standards.
[00:14:17] In regard to talking to developers, Richard wonders if Silona feels like she’s often trying to talk in two languages again when people would come into the room while she was coding.
[00:18:48] Silona tells us about working on doing certifications and how they are going through badges and are in the design phase right now. She also mentions that IEEE recruits from engineering schools all over the world to get their members.
[00:20:00] Richard wonders if some people think certifications are scary and they won’t be able to get them, will this slow down open source development by forcing people to jump through hoops in order to do work.
[00:22:00] Find out about a conversation Silona had with Richard Rockefeller and Larry Brilliant. She talks about an experiment they are doing with three advisory groups which include the technical advisor, marketing advisor, and community advisor, which Georg from CHAOSS is running. Also, she tells us about a great article to check out written by Dries Buytaert on the “Makers and Takers.”
[00:28:20] Richard mentions a great episode to check out on CHAOSScast Podcast with guest Stephen Jacobs, and he gives a shout-out to Rachel Lawson at Drupal.
[00:28:55] Silona shares her thoughts on where she thinks we will be fifty years down the road in terms of badges and certification for open source.
[00:34:14] Find out where you follow Silona on the internet.
Quotes
[00:09:59] “You can pull the data back out, but can you pull the community back out of GitHub?”
[00:13:36] “But, I really do love the not doing the corporate dominance aspect, and the trying to achieve the balance pieces I think is really important when you’re creating a standard, especially if you want true adoptability.”
[00:14:27] “My favorite little metaphor now is chocolate and peanut butter. You put your peanut butter in my chocolate. Oh, you put your chocolate in my peanut butter. And then you’ve got the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.”
[00:23:29] “It’s hard to teach non-profits to become a software company.”
Spotlight
[00:35:08] Richard’s spotlight is Tom “Spot” Callaway, Episode #52 on Sustain Podcast where he was a guest, and listening about his adventure in Canada.
[00:35:48] Silona’s spotlight is InnerSource Commons and the Patterns Working Group.
Links
SustainOSS
SustainOSS Twitter
SustainOSS Discourse
Silona Bonewald Linkedin
Silona Bonewald Twitter
IEEE SA OPEN
Leadingbit Solutions
The Long Now Foundation
CHAOSScast Podcast
Project OCEAN
Digital Impact Alliance Open Source Center
Drupal
Sustain Podcast-Episode 88-Foundations Roundtable: From Maintain to Sustain with Rachel Lawson and other guests
Sustain Podcast-Episode 35-Why the Drupal Community Cares with Rachel Lawson
OSPOCon 2021
IEEE SA OPEN Community Advisory Group Meetings
Balancing Makers and Takers to scale and sustain Open Source by Dries Buytaert
IEEE SA OPEN Community Advisory Group Education
CHAOSScast Podcast-Episode 22: University OSPO Metrics with Stephen Jacobs
Tom Callaway Twitter
Sustain Podcast-Episode 52-Being Willing to be Open: Twenty Years of Coding at Red Hat, with Tom “Spot” Callaway
InnerSource Commons
Special Guest: Silona Bonewald.Support Sustain


