Sure but the same could be said and often is said for open source projects.
Open source devs often have a particular goal or vision in mind and will ignore any attempts to give the users what they actually want, either through issues or pull requests.
We’ve seen it so many times in open source projects, they love having that power over others and become mini dictators.
That’s a really weird way of framing a hobbyist who isn’t being paid using their free time to code what they feel like coding. It seems to me that people who show up and make demands about what someone else does are literally attempting to dictate how that person spends their time. Someone coding what they want, rather than coding what other people want them to code, is just… independent? Autonomous? Do you really think that someone spending their free time how they want to constitutes being a ‘mini dictator’?
It sounds to me like some end users like to have power over others and feel entitled to dictate how those who make the things they use spend their time.
Personally, my suggestion to people with that attitude would be that they learn to make what they want themselves rather than demanding that others do it.
There’s a prolific open-source dev that makes many plugins and themes for a widely-used OSS platform. He’s quite open when asked for new features of it’s something he’s already planning on doing anyway (with no guarantee timeline) or if it’s not. But if it’s a reasonable ask, he’ll always mention that he can prioritise its development if they fund it. He even posts his current contractor rate; it’s quite transparent.
I think more OSS devs should be more open like that. “Yes, I can do that feature request. Sounds like about 2-3 hours work. My hourly is $120 for correct work. Email me here if you’re interested and I’ll send a contract.”
Yes-ish, but some open source devs take it way too far and act against the interests of their userbase because they want to force users into particular behaviours even if the users have been up until that point happy with the way things worked.
There needs to be a way of tlking about this shitty behaviour without being told “just fork it” or “devs can just say no”. They bring too much of the bad parts of society into their work and act shittily and we are supposed to just accept that? There should be a way for non coders to usurp devs who do shit like that.
Also, no, we can’t fork it. We have no coding skills, we have tried but it just doesn’t work for us. “Just fork it” isn’t a valid response to bringing up legit problems with developers ioo.
We aren’t supposed to accept that. We can simply not use their software. And as users that’s the only power we have on devs. But it’s a power that only works on devs who are interested in having many users.
Plus if something has been ignored for so long that it basically needs a full rewrite of some aspect then even if you have the skills to do it, you can’t realistically do it because it’s such a big problem.
Sure but the same could be said and often is said for open source projects.
Open source devs often have a particular goal or vision in mind and will ignore any attempts to give the users what they actually want, either through issues or pull requests.
We’ve seen it so many times in open source projects, they love having that power over others and become mini dictators.
That’s a really weird way of framing a hobbyist who isn’t being paid using their free time to code what they feel like coding. It seems to me that people who show up and make demands about what someone else does are literally attempting to dictate how that person spends their time. Someone coding what they want, rather than coding what other people want them to code, is just… independent? Autonomous? Do you really think that someone spending their free time how they want to constitutes being a ‘mini dictator’?
It sounds to me like some end users like to have power over others and feel entitled to dictate how those who make the things they use spend their time.
Personally, my suggestion to people with that attitude would be that they learn to make what they want themselves rather than demanding that others do it.
… Or pay them for it!
There’s a prolific open-source dev that makes many plugins and themes for a widely-used OSS platform. He’s quite open when asked for new features of it’s something he’s already planning on doing anyway (with no guarantee timeline) or if it’s not. But if it’s a reasonable ask, he’ll always mention that he can prioritise its development if they fund it. He even posts his current contractor rate; it’s quite transparent.
I think more OSS devs should be more open like that. “Yes, I can do that feature request. Sounds like about 2-3 hours work. My hourly is $120 for correct work. Email me here if you’re interested and I’ll send a contract.”
okidoke, fair enough
With open source, you can fork the project.
It should be okay for an open source maintainer to say “no”.
Yes-ish, but some open source devs take it way too far and act against the interests of their userbase because they want to force users into particular behaviours even if the users have been up until that point happy with the way things worked.
There needs to be a way of tlking about this shitty behaviour without being told “just fork it” or “devs can just say no”. They bring too much of the bad parts of society into their work and act shittily and we are supposed to just accept that? There should be a way for non coders to usurp devs who do shit like that.
Also, no, we can’t fork it. We have no coding skills, we have tried but it just doesn’t work for us. “Just fork it” isn’t a valid response to bringing up legit problems with developers ioo.
We aren’t supposed to accept that. We can simply not use their software. And as users that’s the only power we have on devs. But it’s a power that only works on devs who are interested in having many users.
Plus if something has been ignored for so long that it basically needs a full rewrite of some aspect then even if you have the skills to do it, you can’t realistically do it because it’s such a big problem.
Yeah, agreed.