Find the right verb

[chadwhitacre]

We're inventing a new category of economic activity. What verb are we going to use for it?

I don't like "donations" because this is not charity.

Others don't like "payments" because the price isn't set ahead of time with a market mechanic. I'm comfortable with "payment" because it's generic, I would use "purchasing" for the classical market case.

[voxpelli]

"Pay it forward" is a related term

And is this really new? Eg. foundations has been around for long? Companies collaborating on standards and business practices?

[vladh]

Here's one idea.

Why do members pay?

1. (Deontological [^1]) Out of care for maintainers, and doing what's fair towards them.
2. (Consequentialist [^2]) As a way to signal thought leadership by contributing to a new paradigm in Open Source funding.
3. (Consequentialist [^2]) To ensure that the Open Source ecosystem is healthy, which benefits their business, because it means they can operate in a secure, stable, growing industry.

(2) and (3) are payments made with an expectation of future gain. This is an investment.

[^1]: “Because it's right” [^2]: “Because it will cause a valuable thing to happen”

[voxpelli]

4) Appearance – a marketing activity – making it something with expected gain here and now (and which can be marked as an expense here and now) (similar to 2)

[ShaneCurcuru]

Another perspective Allison Randall had in a recent talk is: Why do companies sponsor (the obvious set of) foundations? Fundamentally, what is the purpose for that cash outlay to a sometimes nebulous nonprofit that uses the cash for general services to all their projects?

At the root, they're paying for insurance. Companies realize they rely on both functionality of various projects, as well as maintenance of those projects to some level. So they pay for insurance, either in terms of ability to influence (like board seats on many LF foundations), or on purely investment in whatever the foundation needs to help it's projects.

This feels similar to investment as noted above; although the payback of the investment is reduced risk of failing open source upstream maintenance rather than direct value return from an investment.

Ah - this is the more specific explanation of 3. (Consequentialist) above: the specific ways (better maintenance, access to supply chain makers, whatever) that you're investing for the future with.

[derberg]

I vote for investment - as a business, you choose the library to be part of your business. Thanks to it you were able to innovate fast, release fast, and start earning fast. Now you need to invest back in the library to make sure it does not disappear because replacing it slows you down - meaning you do not innovate fast enough, and this costs you money. So "you" better secure your investment.

I wrote about it more in this article https://www.brainfart.dev/blog/raja-of-open-source where I also explain that you do not have to invest with money on day one as it ain't easy. Do it step by step.

[derberg]

another argument for investment

no support for open source maintainers is basically a part of technical debt. This meme could easily be modified and show miners progressing super fast thanks to adding open source without a plan

[smitty1eGH]

I like "investment", because it mostly captures the point. I dislike "investment", because it implies some binding and explicit ROI (return on investment) expectation. Suggestion: "convestment", to use some fresh coinage that gets at both the sense of community and the vestment idea.

[vladh]

The Alan Kay excerpts I posted in #227 also suggest “investment”.

It strikes me that many of the tech billionaires have already gotten their "upside" many times over from people like Engelbart and other researchers who were supported by ARPA, Parc, ONR, etc. Why would they insist on more upside, and that their money should be an "investment"? That isn't how the great inventions and fundamental technologies were created that eventually gave rise to the wealth that they tapped into after the fact.