Was reading this article, and it got me thinking. There’s lots of people who are happy to complain at length, but what if we made it a point to pick a particular day each year to express our collective gratitude for the work people do for FOSS?
Whether in the form of donations or kind words (maybe even joining a project), it might be something that helps keep people going on the things they love but for which they don’t get a lot of appreciation.
Curious to hear y’all’s thoughts.
Edit: Someone mentioned I Love Free Software Day, which is cool that it exists. I like the idea behind it, but I’m hesitant to piggyback upon a well-known holiday, for fear of being wholly overshadowed (Valentine’s Day is already stressful enough for some people).
Might be nice to have a foundation that would seek out key open source maintainers and direct funds to them, without them needing to self promote. The nebraska initiative?
Doesn’t a country in the EU have one? I can’t recall which one or what the fund is called, but I see mention of projects that get awarded grants every now and again.
NLnet. However they only fund specific types of projects, and there are many open source maintainers who are not interested in money (usually they have a well-paid job already).
there’s nlnet.nl, but I think you have to apply for a grant.
Might be the one I was thinking of