Image: Unsplash / Martin Shreder (https://unsplash.com/@martinshreder)
Developers love them and use them, but few support them; open-source projects. Linux, jQuery, Axios, and others are widely popular. They often collect donations from those who use them. But, typical for donations, donations are not obligatory if you use open-source code.
The Problem
Today we are taking these projects for given. Until they disappear. Some projects are maintained by individuals who have a family, a job, and a life. Not many find help, only a few can live from the donations to maintain the code to keep them up to date with new releases from the code they are running on.
A serious complaint by open-source developers and contributors is that they are offering code that is often used by medium- or large-sized corporations who literally say “thank you” and that’s what they contribute.
While it is understandable that a high school student or a developer from a low-income country can’t donate to a project, big companies could. Allowing the developers to maintain the code of their libraries maintains the ecosystem of open-source libraries the internet is counting on for so long.
The Approach
A way to solve this issue could be that a code’s package.json could work like a DAO inside the code of a software. Rather than doing money transfers from time to time if you remember to donate to a project, such a package - let’s call it Open-Source Contribution Distributors, OSCDs - could participate in transactions made on the website or on income from ad displays and distribute it among all projects that are part of the DAO in your code.
If you make $1 and you set the minimum contribution to 5% ($.05), you will distribute it to maybe two open-source projects, let be Axios and jQuery. Each project in the DAO gets a fair share. And this is why OSCDs can be compared to DAOs.
DAOs are blockchain-based organizations where every participant is treated like a shareholder who can earn a dividend. Rather than starting a DAO with shareholders, the developer starts an OSCD for stakeholders on the internet, those who contribute code via open-source projects, add projects, and other content, and let them participate.
It could also be interesting for those projects to see how many are using their software if they don’t already have statistics.
How it could work
To make it work, the developer would create a file that is automatically updated once an open-source project is installed or content is added (compare to the “package.JSON” file mentioned above).
Based on where and how often software is imported to a software project, the more an imported software earns. This affects the distribution key and avoids that unused software earns based on just being installed rather than being used.
In the DAO-like file, the developer would also set how much of the income would be donated to all organizations.
Maybe it is useful to use a blockchain and make contributions with a cryptocurrency like Ethereum to prevent potential fraud from wannabe open-source projects. The blockchain then could prevent frauds like manipulations. It would, however, still depend on some endpoints with few transactions.
Other Applications
The OSCD can be used for images, music, videos, and any other usage of contribution as well. Imagine you are using stock photos or music from a website like Unsplash. There’s an option to donate to the photographer for a coffee. It would be nicer if they could have a steady inflow if their work is helping a project to succeed and make money.
It’s imaginable that even videos could use such a tool. Often you find videos on YouTube that use lots of stock material. A content creator could then include a distribution file to let those participating who created the content that is being used in the video.
Limits and Challenges
Of course, using an OSCD would be voluntary and people often do not contribute code and work to open-source projects to earn money. But support from a community using open-source code can help to maintain a healthy open-source environment and keeps the internet running in the future. If it is possible to make donating more convenient for those relying on this software, open-source projects will benefit.
But the limits such an approach faces are how to develop it and where to start. Open-source projects would need to become an entity that can collect donations which is not a problem if they raise money via Paypal or another payment solution.
But they must become an entity able to be connected to a larger project which will contribute to them regularly. And this project then must maintain a code that doesn’t break easily.
Does it have to be a blockchain solution or not? And would an OSCD be open source or not? Would it need its own contribution from users or can it operate easily without or few contributors?