That two experienced developers could hold such conflicting views on commit access belies a quiet but growing tension between past and present norms in open source. The salient issue for maintainers today is less about growing contributor numbers and more about navigating the flow of developers who are clamoring for their time. In a world where single maintainers like Dominic Tarr maintain hundreds of tiny modules, we need to reframe the question from “Why would he do that?” to “How do we design for trustless interactions?”
Viewed through this lens, Sponsors can be understood as a first, important stepping stone towards company sponsorships, which seem inevitable for GitHub given the presence of Organization accounts. Their eyes light up when they talk about specific developers. If I ask why, I tend to hear a few common responses: 1) they’re learning a specific skill, and watching that person is helpful, or 2) they’re experienced developers who just love being able to see how “the best” do it. it struck me the other day that open source is a sort of “high-latency streaming”. the relationship between a prominent GitHub developer and their audience, and a prominent Twitch streamer and their audience, is similar: they gain followers because people enjoy watching them do something in public. an additional set of motivations, which is, “I want to watch and learn from you”. A graphic artist or a blogger who’s funded on Patreon doesn’t quite have that same relationship to their audience. In those cases, I think their output – the artifacts they create – takes center stage. there are probably others who just love watching the person who makes it. With companies, open source developers are selling a product. With individuals, they’re selling themselves.
