Regular contributions to upstream software
Nathan Schneider PublicSeen by 196Our primary service is Mastodon, a piece of free, open-source software. We do not yet contribute to its development financially. In a recent poll, members expressed strong interest in doing this. I am advancing this thread on the basis of that signal.
Thanks @Nic Wistreich for reminding me here that we need to do this.
Update: I have changed the name of this to reflect the many voices here that express interest in contributing not just to Mastodon but to other fediverse software projects.
How much should we contribute monthly to Mastodon development?
ranked choice by Nathan Schneider Closed Mon 28 Nov 2022 2:01PM
It is clear that we need to broaden this conversation!
This is a poll to get a sense of what members think would be a reasonable contribution to Mastodon development. For context, members have expressed strong interest in doing this. Our current monthly income is about 1k GBP, and we are now budgeting about 500 GBP to the Tech and Community Working Groups, total.
Based on the outcome of this poll, I (or someone else!) can make a formal proposal.
The contribution can be made automatically through Open Collective.
Results
| Results | Option | Rank | % of points | Points | Mean | Voters | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25 GBP | 1 | 24 | 161 | 4 | 44 | |||
| 50 GBP | 2 | 23 | 150 | 3 | 44 | |||
| 10 GBP | 3 | 21 | 136 | 3 | 44 | |||
| 100 GBP | 4 | 17 | 109 | 2 | 44 | |||
| 5 GBP | 5 | 16 | 104 | 2 | 44 | |||
| Not voted | 0 | 0 | 226 |
| -1 - 50 GBP | ||
| 0 - 100 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
My inclination would be to contribute 100 GBP, since 10% of our income to the group that maintains our core piece of software makes sense. I went with 50 GBP as #1 because I would like for that 100 to be split between Mastodon and Loomio, in the event that we're not also contributing to the latter.
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
I don't know how much capacity there is in the budget, and think paying the moderators & admins for their time should be a priority – so if it was a choice would put that ahead of this. I also back the support of Loomio mentioned by Sky Leite. But on the assumption there is capacity, then 50-100 sounds reasonable. Could obvs be reviewed if, say, Github/community issues are being ignored by Mastodon maintainers. Thanks for responding so fast btw,
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
I’m a bit loathe to suggest £100 since it’s a bit big & I don’t want us to have to cut back if budget changes, but it does seem a good amount while £50 seems a bit small. Maybe £75 just to reassure my fiscally anxious self? Or be bold & go £100 if enough others agree. Giving to Loomio also seems like a good idea, but it’s not as actively in development, so the priorities seem a bit different. Do we already pay for loomio?
| -1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 0 - 5 GBP | ||
| 1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
Definitely a good practice to contribute upstream to projects we depend on. Though I've seen a recent post suggesting that Eugen/Mastodon is already very adequately funded (can't find it right now, will try to dig out), so maybe we can support other projects. Echoing what others have said, I'd like to prioritise TWG first; then split e.g. 100 GBP p/m between various upstream projects we rely on. That said, for now, good with £25 p/m to Mastodon as a starting point to our upstream donations.
| -1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 0 - 10 GBP | ||
| 1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
In all, a pretty uninformed vote, but to me £25 seems it wouldn't hit the budget too bad and is a meaningful enough contribution so as not to be "freeloading" off Mastodon development.
| -1 - 50 GBP | ||
| 0 - 25 GBP | ||
| 1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 2 - 5 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
I voted 'middle of the road' here (50 GBP) because, although I appreciate the ways in which Mastodon development has enabled the growth of the Fediverse and will likely continue to do so, I am personally worried about some of the focus of the project feeling like it is about Mastodon instead of about the greater Fediverse.
There are many up-and-coming other ActivityPub servers that I'd rather support instead of only supporting the incumbent (after testing them, discussing them as a community).
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
My general preference is 10% of income, which at current budget is 100 GBP/month.
But it doesn't all have to go directly to mastodon development every month. I could see us sponsor (in-house) development of plugins or fixes (at predetermined rate) which we then opensource and contribute.
@sky makes a good point though about other contributions. Maybe we could/should maintain a list of orgs/causes to donate to, and how much, and review that quarterly or something...
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
I'd like to contribute to the the mastodon devs for providing us with the bird app alternative just when the community needed it.
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
Supporting the software we depend on is important!
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
I think considering that social.coop's "main" existence is using Mastodon I put 10% as the choice. But similar to other people I wouldn't tie this entirely to the main mastodon project but also include other development projects towards the greater Mastodon / fediverse sphere
| -1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 0 - 10 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
With the Fediverse going mainstream and Mastodon now about 95% of the 'installed base' they are of few, maybe only project with good sustainability outlook already. Meanwhile Fediverse has languished, unable to evolve its protocols and with lotsa Protocol Decay. Mastodon is the 'Gmail' in the room around which the fedi has become shaped. Their focus, on their own app, is justified. But its open standards and other apps that explore potential of the fedi beyond Microblogging where money should go
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
Ideally we can fund all of our upstream software in some way - Mastodon, Loomio, anything else we use.
Does Meet.Coop fund BigBlueButton? Can we ask them to?
This should be something we lead by example. OpenCollective showing flows of funds to other OSS and groups would be great.
| -1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 0 - 25 GBP | ||
| 1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
I think this is a good thought but I honestly think contributing to mastodon project should be lower priority than paying our own workers and maintaining our own infrastructure. Especially if we are considering moving to a fork like hometown, they probably need financial support more than mastodon. In addition I am beginning to observe some undesirable behavior from Eugen and how he chooses to run the project. I am still directly contributing to Mastodon but I would just advise prudence.
| -1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 0 - 10 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
I agree we should send Mastodon some funds but the project seems well funded at this point (29k/month last I saw).
I’d like to see SocialCoop fund other Fediverse projects, specifically those that share some of the cooperative structure, values, or have planned advanced governance features such as Bonfire, or the Hometown mastodon fork.
| -1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 0 - 5 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
I love the idea of setting aside 100 GBP to support upstream projects, if we can afford it, but I don't know about funding Mastodon particularly. A lot depends on how they choose to respond to the surge in interest. They've got hundreds of new issues and PRs in their Github. Are they going to grow so they can address them? Then we should help fund that. But if they don't, and development is largely happening elsewhere, and we rely on a fork or on plugins, we should focus on funding that.
| -1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 0 - 10 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
I disagree with contributing. (1) We should not contribute if we would be supporting mastodon.social and mastodon.online. The Mastodon Patreon is for both, and the OpenCollective page has debits for "moderation" which I figure is also for those instances. These are huge instances with a not-so-great reputation. Is there even a way to support just the open source development? (2) Our money can go farther elsewhere, like mods/admins on our instance. Mastodon has received grants.
| -1 - 50 GBP | ||
| 0 - 25 GBP | ||
| 1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
I'm strongly in favor of supporting the Mastodon software development, but like Isabel I'm not excited about us supporting the massive mastodon.social instance (or other super massive flagship instances). I don't know if there's a way to distinguish between the two when donating.
| -1 - 50 GBP | ||
| 0 - 25 GBP | ||
| 1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 2 - 5 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
I think 25-50 is reasonable (basically roughly 10% of the tech budget). That being said I agree with the others who raise concerns that this sponsors large instances that are not necessarily well-moderated, and that there's a conflict of interest with Gargron both developing the core software and promoting his instance. If the money can be earmarked only for developing the software, I would be more comfortable. Or maybe we can sponsor one of those third party Fediverse instance pickers
| -1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 0 - 10 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
Given what I've been learning about how poorly Mastodon is spending it's money (apparently spending $175/hr on an iOS app devs) I think we should a) have a better understanding of how they are spending their money and b) consider spending it on other projects that are doing more to advance the broader federation goals.
| -1 - 5 GBP | ||
| 0 - 10 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
.... I wrote too much for a "vote" comment, so will comment below. in summary, not in favour of donating to mastodon as things stand now.
| -1 - 100 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 10 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
I agree with many of the others here that 10% of our income is a good amount to shoot for. I love FOSS applications and would be glad to see us support Mastodon in a big way.
| -1 - 50 GBP | ||
| 0 - 25 GBP | ||
| 1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 2 - 5 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
If we set the TWG monthly budget to 250 EUR (~215 GBP right now), it seems disproportionate to be spending more than an additional 20% of that on sponsoring Mastodon development. I would also like to prioritize paying *WG members for their work.
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| -1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 0 - 50 GBP | ||
| 1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 2 - 100 GBP | ||
| 3 - 5 GBP |
Sustaining the tech working group (etc) and our other infrastructure is a priority but we should definitely be contributing upstream. So definitely support this. Thanks for initiating.
| -1 - 10 GBP | ||
| 0 - 5 GBP | ||
| 1 - 25 GBP | ||
| 2 - 50 GBP | ||
| 3 - 100 GBP |
As a new member, I really enjoy reading through the discussion. It’s illuminating. That said, my vote is fairly uninformed, relying on the arguments in this thread. It seems to me that we want to (and should) contribute to the open source dev that undergirds our own project. At the same time, we do not want to subsidize other instances that do not share our co-op values. As Mastadon grows, it seems like they’re directing resources toward their own instances. I’m for $100, but not all to Mast.
I think
a) mastodon is adequately funded for now
b) I think donations go to mastodon dev AND running the big instances, without being able to distinguish
c) we should support the broader ecosystems of co-operativism and fediverse stuff (as @Arnold Schrijver explains well)
... so when it comes to vote for actually donating to mastodon, I will vote against, but would love to send that money to other aligned/related causes, such as:
a) alternative fediverse software (e.g. Bonfire), it's in our interest to keep the ecosystem from capture by one tool/org/person/etc
b) wider co-operative development aims, which could involve donating more to Platform6 (our fiscal host on opencollective), or other co-operative social media instances
c) other instances which struggle for money, but play important roles in making the fediverse a nourishing space
d) people within social.coop, who might be able to participant more deeply with some money (so far, I think most of the people contributing have enough other money... which is usually the case in these kind of volunteer-y things, and that is not very fair participation) (I did a very unscientific "mini poll" recently in tech chat, and a good number of the people were currently being paid, by someone else..)
e) anything/person/org/etc that provides a decent counterbalance to the power/domination of mastodon as an all encompassing entity for the fediverse.... that could look very varied in practise.
I think it's important to lead by example and fund upstream open source dependencies, even if it is just a token. Same goes for Loomio. So rather than zero or the upper bound -- even token funds flowing to our upstreams would be good.
I also don't think we should send funds to things we don't actually use (for starters). I'm open to revisiting this but also might be best for outside social coop. Eg if there are particular features we'd like to see, then an Open Collective for that feature could be something to fund if aligned with our needs.
I definitely agree about helping fund software that we actually use in social.coop and try to steer clear of funding software (e.g. Bonfire) simply because it is a good idea, or we use it elsewhere.
my thinking is along the lines of we use "The Fediverse", and as with co-opertivism (and many other things) is part of an ecosystem, and funding the ecosystem is super important. being able to direct funds in solidarity, which has a long history in co-operativism (I guess...:) )
I'm definitely a fan of the Fediverse as a concept and an ecosystem, but it feels like it's going to get pretty big? Having our own use as a measuring stick still seems like a good idea to me. Also, hasn't the focus of social.coop been more on platform cooperatives than the fediverse per se?
I think the success of the fediverse is not at all clear right now, it might be we end up with a mastodon-verse, and a recentralization with that, around eugen.
already we can notice that mastodon makes feature decisions that are not best for social.coop (e.g. the registration stuff that now wants to send people to join mastodon website if it can).
there's where I see supporting the wider fediverse as important.
that's in addition to supporting co-operativism, not instead (I also make the subtle different of referring to the general principles of co-operatativism, platform co-ops being a related, but narrower concept).
I feel like we are being unstrategic at the moment, throwing up proposals for how to spend money without discussing our larger organizing strategy. The question of how to distribute surplus in a cooperative is a key question that reflects its goals and economic objectives. I think we need to have a more organized discussion of those goals and objectives before making specific proposals.
Thanks for saying this Matt. For what it's worth I'm also feeling this tension when it comes to discussing options for technical work. Maybe it's time to organize another co-op wide members meeting? But as Nathan said above, the idea for this did come from a poll, but I think it was pre-seeded with some ideas?
maybe a messy chaotic bit of throwing ideas around is a good bit to start with.
and would be great to also then put that into a larger organizing strategy. esp. given there is a bazillion new people, and could get quite chaotic really quickly.
in general maybe more open discussion about "how to manage surplus" than "which of a list of things do you want" is good, as we can tease out underlying principles we might want to be operating by.
Agreed on the need for strategic discussions. But just as a reminder, the recent funding proposals (that I've proposed at least) are downstream from this process, going on for several months: https://www.loomio.com/p/oVgO1MNU/poll-what-should-social-coop-invest-extra-funds-in-
Yes, hence my point about leading by example. “Co-ops should fund the upstream software and services they rely on, lest they have to shoulder the full burden of software maintenance”. Extremely strategic!
How about we hold another Social.Coop strategy session(s) in late January? We can ask for volunteers to organize the session and facilitate a preliminary discussion here on Loomio so that the great energy and engagement we are seeing now is not dissipated.
This mind map, made after our last strategy session (in 2021?), is a start. Since I have been involved Social.Coop has been feeling its way, without anything like a strategy or plan. (Which has been positive in many ways.) We refer to the ICA principles, but most cooperatives adapt and improve them to reflect their particular situation, values, and aspirations (Mondragon, Cooperation Jackson, and DisCO are examples. Then there are the Solidarity Economy Principles, and, perhaps most radical, the practice of CECOSESOLA in Venezuela, where constant conversation is the key.)
As a new user, this is a great mind map. "Experiment in user controlled social media" and "social network of the future" stand out to me for consideration in the larger strategy for the org and in the allocation of funds. If there is a vision to contribute to or conceive the "social network of the future", that should be part of any larger strategy.
I am new here too, and strongly favour mind maps (mm) as a way to keep the big picture in view. Matt's mm is excellent. The above points of view are all good. My sense is that we should support cooperative values and projects as well as technical diversity and openness.
Once the Silly Season is behind us, a strategy session in late January seems like a good idea, one in which we use the mm as a starting point, amending it and adding more detail where necessary. Once that is done, we can then decide how best to deploy our resources in keeping with our community values.
I also like good documentation. The wiki seems like best place to do that where we have all our stuff in one place and have traceable history of our evolution.
Do you have a proposal for how we should contribute to fediverse software projects?
opt-in by Nathan Schneider Closed Thu 1 Dec 2022 7:02PM
This thread has seen lots of interest in contributing to a broader array of fediverse software projects than Mastodon. But how should we do that? The purpose of this poll is to invite people with specific proposals for how best to do this can suggest them for later consideration and evaluation.
After this poll, we can assess which patterns seem to be rising to the surface.
Results
| Results | Option | Voters | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| I have an idea! | 8 |    | |||
| I support another person's idea | 12 |    | |||
| Not voted | 250 |                   |
I propose that we allocate a budget (say 50 GBP/month) to the Tech Working Group to distribute to fediverse projects that they think would be strategic and values-aligned to support.
Honestly this conversation feels a little rushed. Delegating to the Tech Working Group feels premature and out of scope, especially if we're not giving them more specific guidance. As an alternative, we could start by developing a scoring rubric for what we're looking for from outside projects: alignment with values, technical benefits...
I recommend that we list the hardware and software on which we depend then decide how much money we would like to allocate to each item.
Ideally, we should be supporting hardware and software that is developed and maintained in a co-operative manner. So, perhaps the list should include items that would move us toward a fully co-operative environment.
I agree with Isabel that we should develop priorities & guidelines before choosing specific recipients (unless there is urgent need). There are many things we could focus on: how much we use an upstream project, how much unmet need they have, how their values align with ours, whether they are potential future partners, etc. I would love to hear from the wider community in what seems most important. Then, perhaps volunteers could form a temporary group to research answers?
I prefer to fund folks doing the non-engineering work first; rather than engineering projects; as coders frequenlty get higher priority due to how white supremacist imperial patriarchy. prioritizes technocratic solutioning.
Some community membersworking on trust & safety of the Fediverse we could fund:
In particular:
(1) Agree with @Nathan Schneider - Tech Working Group should have a small monthly fund for things that might pop up ALSO
(2) Agree with @Zee Spencer that tech solutionism is a trap, but that there are items with deliverables we could buy (as in, not charity but exchange money for pre-agreed upon products and services) like explanatory art pieces, emojos, et cetera that would make our experience on this platform better and to share how socialcoop works with our fedi neighbors
I agree with Isabel
I'm not voting on this, because I'm torn. On the one hand, I would argue that it's not unreasonable for the amount to donate to Mastodon to be 10% of surplus. On the other hand, I echo what others have said about the direction the project is going, the way it's run, and the alternatives that might actually suit social.coop better.