Im a big fan of “you can either pay me to fix this issue, or fix it yourself” model. Nobody should be pressured to maintain a open source project once they’re done with it themselves.
Exactly! In fact, that was the original free software MO. The whole maintainership shenanigans became a thing after companies started exploiting it for free labor.
We can make some headway by pushing govs to adopt OSS. The Italians have a law “public money → public code”. The whole public sector including public schools should be switching to open source. And part of that would compel contributions of some form. Whether it’s code contributions or payment for support. People should be demanding that their tax revenue is not wasted on software that does not enrich the commons. With profit-driven corporations it’s always a game where a number of variables have to be just right for the company. But the public sector is very much overlooked.
I recently looked at a Danish university and was disgusted with what I saw. They used MS Office and Google docs, and students were pushed to use those tools. They used Matlab not GNU Octave, because that’s what they saw industry using. Schools should be leading industry, not following it.
The main driving force behind use of proprietary software in educational institutions are the software companies themselves. They have an incentive in it. When the students graduate and join the workforce, their employers are more likely to choose the software that these new workers already know. So it’s like an investment for software companies to get their software into the curriculum. They spend considerable money and effort into it. Regular people stand no chance in pushing for free software - mainly because most of them don’t even care.
This is the unfortunate truth. Mathworks tools are heavily used in the engineering space, so it’s an obvious choice for academia to teach.
As much as I try to get my company off of Matlab/Simulink, it’s a challenge. Just so much legacy already written in it
so it’s an obvious choice for academia to teach.
I can’t agree. You could perhaps say Matlab is the default/non-critically-analyzed choice for academia. GNU Octave uses the same language as Matlab. A student who masters GNU Octave will be able to use Matlab just fine.
IIRC, Matlab’s significant difference is Simulink. So if a class actually intends to cover Simulink then it’d perhaps be fair enough for just that class to use Matlab. But even that’s not ideal. Ideal would be the school paying students to add what’s needed in GNU Octave.
I don’t do it for the money. I do it because I like doing it.
That’s why I like the GPL. I’m fine with people using my software for personal use, or for commercial use if that’s integrated in another open source software.
If a company want to use my software with an unrestrictive opensource license, we’re going to have to discuss license price.
When I can I try to bring up the idea of “pro bono” developer work with employed developers I know.
Outside of FAANG it garners confused looks because it’s so alien. But the argument never gets any logical pushback because the industry is culturally sick on this issue:
“ Do you use and rely on open source software?
If so some percentage of what your employer gains from that should be provided back, not out of some morality but to keep afloat the open source software ecosystem you and your employer are benefiting from.
What’s more, you and employer will gain more expertise in said software and can even ensure it is more reliable for your purposes.
All employers of developers using open source ought to dedicate a certain number of developer-days per month to open source maintenance and proudly make this number public.
Also, this idea isn’t new, lawyers have been doing this for decades. See this info graphic from a major Australian Law Firm showing off how 1/24th of their work is pro bono.
That’s right, the sharks might be better people for society than your industry is for itself. “
