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OpenBSD Looking At Funding Shortfall In 2014
Freshly Exhumed writes "Today the OpenBSD mailing list carried a plea from Theo de Raadt for much needed financial aid for the OpenBSD foundation: 'I am resending this request for funding our electricity bills because it is not yet resolved. We really need even more funding beyond that, because otherwise all of this is simply unsustainable. This request is the smallest we can make.' Bob Beck, of the OpenBSD Foundation, added: 'the fact is right now, OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on.'"
The electricity bill in question is $20,000 a year for build servers located in Canada.
1. the nature of OpenBSD means build servers are the word of god on the lips and hearts of every developer and user. their physical verifiability and integrity is sacrosanct. finding a remote build location in this the year of our NSA 2014 would prove difficult if not impossible.
2. this is controversial. its not an attempt to stoke a flamewar, but it i feel must be said. the BSD license itself hinders the visibility of the projects its designed to protect. It allows corporations, the very entities that theo wants his electric bill 'on their books' to ignore the project entirely and slurp down releases whenever a security hole shows up on their product. Other than a README most corporations arent required to think twice about the code, let alone where it comes from, under the BSD. IMHO only when openbsd.org starts returning srvfail will these companies know what theyve lost. GPLvN remind companies on a per-release basis where the bread for which their butter goes comes from. code must face the scrutiny of developers, engineers, legal teams, managers and a multitude of other stakeholders.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Theo et. al. might turn up their noses at the idea, but a $40,000 kickstarter to keep OpenBSD going might not be a bad idea.
Rewards might include: kudos for contributions, limited edition (kickstarter only) t-shirts/posters/soundtracks, CD sets (duh), and for big contributors ($2500-$5000) a customized VDD set up for whatever purposes you want, yours to keep or share as you like.
Finding God in a Dog
Well, you know I was a fan of OpenBSD until I had to interact with the mailing list.
I figured they're all professionals and giving their time for free. The best way to show respect is to not waste their time. So, I carefully read up on the things I was asking about. I documented what I had read in the message and which questions remained unanswered. Actually during this process, I actually answered some of my questions, simply by being more careful.
So, I then posted.
And I got polite, helpful responses, even though I was compiling a custom kernel which is strongly discouraged. But then Theo himself weighed in and... gave polite, helpful responses.
I remained a fan of OpenBSD.
Maybe you did get on his bad side, but much of the hostility I've seen in the OSS community is people getting grumpy because someone comes along and would rather the professionals help them for free than take the time to use google.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I had the pleasure of having beer with Theo when he was in Edmonton, AB several years ago. He even refused to let me go to the ATM to grab cash; he bought the beer for me.
My only complaint about the guy was that he was way too smart, and I struggled to keep up with all the computing security things we discussed. Hardly the worst complaint to have about him :)
He just has zero patience for bullshit, and I think that's why people complain about his personality. If you ever get the opportunity to meet him in person, I believe you'd rethink this meme about him being an ass.