On Fri, Aug 08, 2003 at 10:32:07AM -0600, Joel Baker wrote: > > > * want to contribute something to a project they respect > > > * want to help out Debian users > > > * want to help promote the goals of Debian > > > > These are bad reasons. > > They are also the only reasons anyone would want to contribute to Debian, > rather than to, say, NetBSD. Or any other open-source OS you might care > to name. "Because it's there" may be a reason to code, but it produces no > motivation whatsoever to contribute to Debian when there are MUCH easier > places to contribute to. Start with the things about Debian which are distinctly different from other projects. You should be able to find some things which you want to do which depend on these things. If not... well, why *are* you here? > > I don't think you're going to get it, either. It's basically the same > > question as "Why do people write free software?", and if you come up > > with "altruism", "politics", or "respect" then you're barking up the > > wrong tree. > > Funny. I thought the FSF was, at least origionally, more or less entirely > about self-interest, altruism, and politics. The organisation might have been founded for those reasons, although I think it was primarily politics. I don't think you'll find much (if any) GNU code that was written because of them. Most of it was written because "I need a foo. I don't *have* a foo, but I *do* know how to make one". > So tell us - why *do* people write free software? I write software because I can, and I release it as free software because that makes it better over time. Others will vary (I'm not in the mood for writing an essay on the subject). -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -><- |
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