
Contributor
The origin story behind the best open source projects and communities.
Latest episodes

Mar 5, 2025 • 40min
Messages, Not Metadata: Session with Kee Jefferys
Kee Jefferys (@JefferysKee) is the technical co-founder of Session, the end-to-end encrypted messenger that emphasizes user confidentiality and anonymity. Session uses a blockchain-based decentralized network for message transmission and is open-source, so the system can be run entirely by its community. In this episode, Kee explains the importance of reducing metadata, the challenges of centralization, and the role of incentives in creating a decentralized network. Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!In this episode we discuss:Why the demand for better privacy has increased How Session differs from other encrypted messaging platforms Combining encryption and incentive modelsWhy open-source is so critical to messaging applications trying to prove their securityHow Session could outlast its developersLinks:Session

Feb 5, 2025 • 36min
Moving Money: Formance with Clément Salaün
Clément Salaün (@superzamp) is the co-founder and CTO of Formance, the open-source platform which is building an agnostic infrastructure for the future of the financial Internet. Formance is divided into several modules which allow fintech engineers to build and operate complex flow of funds, weaving together multiple payment rails with internal ledger accounts. Tune in to find out what it takes to build a scalable and extensible financial core system.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
How Clem got into fintech through Minecraft
Thoughts on the European open-source scene
Formance’s ratio of community size to Github stars
The influence of crypto on Formance
What it means to split an open-source project into many repositories
Links:
Formance

Jan 15, 2025 • 38min
LLM Evaluation: Opik with Gideon Mendels
Gideon Mendels, co-founder and CEO of Comet, dives into the fascinating world of AI with a focus on Opik, his open-source model evaluation platform. He shares how Opik's rise exceeded expectations and emphasizes the critical role of CI/CD in AI development. Gideon also discusses the alarming decline in dedicated machine learning engineers and differentiates between genuine and 'fake' open-source solutions. The conversation wraps up with insights on the evolving AI landscape and the need for organizations to adapt to new evaluation methodologies.

Oct 9, 2024 • 29min
Mobile Observability on OpenTelemetry: Embrace with Hanson Ho
Hanson Ho (@bidetofevil) is an Android Architect at Embrace, the mobile-first observability solution built on OpenTelemetry. Embrace began as a proprietary platform but went open-source at the end of 2023. Hanson shares about how the project is still at the beginning of its open-source journey and why his team is committed to collaborative development with the larger community of OpenTelemetry.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
The missing piece in mobile observability tooling
How Embrace switched its perspective after going open-source
3 use cases for Embrace
Links:
Embrace
OpenTelemetry
Other Episodes:
Robust Observability: OpenTelemetry with Austin Parker

Sep 25, 2024 • 33min
No PhD Required: Restate with Stephan Ewen
Stephan Ewen (@StephanEwen) is the co-founder of Restate, the open-source workflow-as-code engine. Restate is lightweight, simple, and provides durable execution. Before Restate, Stephan co-created Apache Flink, the open-source stream processing framework. Lessons learned from Flink have heavily influenced the development of Restate, although Stephan says they have exact opposite use cases.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
The history of Flink and the impact of the 2016 U.S. election
Why tooling for real-time transactional problems has historically had room for improvement
What constitutes “modern” workflow engines
Can you use Restate for any use case?
Moving from a large company to a small startup as an open-source developer
Links:
Restate
Apache Flink
People mentioned:
Kostas Tzoumas (@kostas_tzoumas)
Other episodes:
Temporal with Maxim Fateev

May 15, 2024 • 27min
Ground Control: Lunar with Eyal Solomon
Eyal Solomon (@EyalSolomo44643) is the CEO and co-founder of Lunar, an open-source platform which bills itself as the “first reverse API gateway.” Lunar allows engineering teams to monitor, manage, and optimize API consumption. According to Eyal, it’s very easy to integrate with APIs, but difficult to keep them maintained, and there was a clear need for a generic solution to control and scale every API consumed in production.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
How most companies think their API maintenance is a unique problem
The importance of managing API consumption in the face of the AI revolution
Why Eyal and his team decided to open-source Lunar
Future plans for Lunar, including the development of autonomous optimization and pre-built flows
Eyal’s thoughts on how to start conversations with potential enterprise clients
Links:
Lunar
People mentioned:
Roy Gabbay (LinkedIn)

Apr 24, 2024 • 37min
Metadata Management: DataHub with Shirshanka Das
Shirshanka Das (@shirshanka) is the CTO of Acryl Data and founder of DataHub, which bills itself as the #1 open-source metadata platform. It enables data discovery, data observability and federated governance to help tame complex data ecosystems. Shirshanka first developed DataHub while at LinkedIn, but has grown it into an independent project with a thriving community.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
How DataHub differs from traditional data catalogs
Themes around why community members get involved and stick with the project
Partnering with Netflix to develop runtime metadata model extensibility
The influence of the pandemic on DataHub’s open-sourcing
Dealing with the future of a project with big community and unlimited scope
Links:
DataHub
The History of DataHub

Apr 10, 2024 • 32min
Take Your Own Advice: vlcn with Matt Wonlaw
After his first child was born, Matt Wonlaw (@tantaman) imagined giving his son life advice. What kind of life did he want his kid to lead? At the time, he was working for Facebook, and he decided that his own life needed a change in direction. So Matt started vlcn, aka Vulcan Labs, a research company that develops open-source projects like CR-SQLite and Materialite. vlcn has an unusual business model – Matt receives donations and sponsorships from users and clients. It’s all part of his mission to rethink the modern data stack for writing rich and complex applications.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
One reason that software is still too hard to write: Object orientations
How CR-SQLite allows databases to be merged together and Materialite provides Incremental View Maintenance for JavaScript
Why coding directly to relations can provide a more flexible and efficient approach to building applications
Matt’s decision to build vlcn as a research lab rather than as a startup
Thoughts for the future on PGLite
Links:
vlcn (Vulcan Labs)
CR-SQLite
Materialite
fly.io
PGLite
People mentioned:
Johannes Schickling (@schickling)

Mar 27, 2024 • 31min
Secret Sauce: Amplication with Yuval Hazaz
Amplication is an open-source development platform for scalable and secure Node.js applications. It allows engineers to skip writing boilerplate code and offers the flexibility to customize and add components. Amplification was created by Yuval Hazaz (@Yuvalhazaz1), a veteran developer who determined that low-code platforms save time but restrict freedom. Instead, Amplication uses code generation to reliably and consistently build robust production‑ready backend services.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
Yuval’s “secret sauce” for building an open-source community
How platform engineers can use Amplication for company-wide standardization
A baseline organic growth rate for open-source projects
The role of generative AI in code modernization
Links:
Amplication

Mar 13, 2024 • 40min
To the Moon: OpenBB with Didier Lopes
OpenBB is an open-source investment research platform created by Didier Lopes (@didier_lopes). OpenBB grew out of a project called Gamestonk Terminal that Didier began working on shortly before the Gamestop short squeeze in January 2021. Today, OpenBB has evolved into an infrastructure platform that allows users to build extensions and access financial data with automation and customization.
Contributor is looking for a community manager! If you want to know more, shoot us an email at eric@scalevp.com.
Subscribe to Contributor on Substack for email notifications!
In this episode we discuss:
What Vice Media got wrong about OpenBB
Some major contributors to the project and the features or directions that they proposed
How a machine learning engineer from Bloomberg reached out about OpenBB
Different types of OpenBB users – students, retail investors, and other financial professionals
OpenBB’s exciting AI roadmap
Links:
OpenBB
People mentioned:
James Maslek (@jmaslek11
Artem Veremey (@artemvv)
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