Ever since I was introduced to the idea of Open Source Software(OSS), I have questioned the sustainability of it. After all, how can something be free, in a system where everything has a cost? Unfortunately, it’s difficult to have in depth discussions about my concerns, as it’s such a polarized subject.
However, with the #TwitterMigration of users fleeing a platform maintained by a corporation, to an open source platform run by volunteers, it seems that now is very important time to talk about this.
For anyone unfamiliar with the term Open Source Software, Wikipedia defines it as software “that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose.” It’s not necessarily free software, but it often is.
I should also note at this point, that this article isn’t going to be a dichotomous look at OSS, claiming that it’s either good or bad. It’s about the issues and risks inherent to it.
Sustainability of Open Source Software?
The main concern I’ve always had with OSS is around the sustainability of it. Whether we like it or not, we live in a society where everything has a cost. Hosting software/documentation on a server costs money. Writing/updating software, costs time. These costs need to be paid somehow.
When it comes to corporate software, the costs are covered by the customers. Whether the user is directly paying for the software, or the company selling user’s data to advertisers and the like, the company in question is managing a revenue flow. They have salespeople, marketers, and accountants to ensure that the revenue continues, and thus, that software developers can be paid.
This is why, when I first learned about OSS, I asked, how can it be sustainable without any reliable source of revenue? The short answer is, it isn’t sustainable.
I’m sure that at this point, all the OSS advocates will be screaming about all the different open source projects that have been going strong for years. Surely that proves that it’s sustainable? Not really, because Open Source Software is made possible by inequality, which isn’t sustainable.
While there are cases where Open Source Software is being provided or supported by a corporation, it’s generally written by people who aren’t being paid for it. This means that the people writing it have both the time, and the energy to sit down and write software that they’re not being paid for.
This is where privilege comes in, because having the time and/or energy to write software for free isn’t a luxury that everyone has. Software developers do, because we’re paid so well that it’s easy to order in some delivery and sit at our desks to write software after the work day is done. However, we live in a world where far too many people are working 2 jobs just to survive. Sitting down to write software after pulling a double is an unrealistic expectation.
The reason why volunteer driven OSS isn’t sustainable, is because this privilege of having the time/energy to write it, comes from the high levels of inequality that many software developers benefit from. I won’t go into the hows and whys that such high inequality is unsustainable, because so much has been written about it already.
One of the horrible effects of this requirement of privilege on OSS comes in the area of job hunting. When job hunting in the software development world, it’s largely expected for the application to have some demonstrated interest in software through Open Source contributions. As pointed out earlier, this is much harder for someone working 2 jobs to survive, so it skewers the job hunt in favour of someone with a privileged background.
The Impact on Mastodon
As I pointed out at the beginning, the #TwitterMigration makes this a very important time to talk about this intersection of privilege and the Open Source community.
The thing about Mastodon, as opposed to Twitter, is that all the software is Open Source, meaning that it’s written by volunteers. Similarly, the servers are all run by volunteers, who rely either on their own money, or on donations from the community.
This ensures that most, if not all, of the developers, mods, and admins on Mastodon are people with a rather high level of privilege. Anyone who’s studied intersectionality knows that privilege and inequality falls along the lines of race, gender identity, and sexuality.
This isn’t to say that for-profit tech companies don’t have issues with racism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia. They do, but that’s also been written about a lot, by folks more knowledgeable than I.
In fact, we’ve already seen some terrible cases of mismanagement on Mastodon caused by this. Tracy Chou, noted software engineer was kicked off Mastodon for pointing out the very same privilege that I’m talking about here. Noted Journalist and Economist Erica Ifill had her Mastodon account suspended without any reason whatsoever.
While Twitter does have a horrible record itself for standing up to white supremacy (I’ve seen accounts with the N-word in the account name), actions like this on the part of major Mastodon servers is leaving a lot of people from marginalized communities thinking that Mastodon is even worse for them.
The Flipside
As I said, this isn’t a dichotomous look at OSS. Personally, I do believe that Open Source Software is very important, in certain areas. Things like programming languages, popular frameworks (like Vue.js and Ruby on Rails), and IDEs should always be free and Open Source to encourage adoption and help newcomers to the industry. I learned C/C++ with an IDE (and encyclopedia-sized manual) that was given to me by a friend of the family. Not an option for most folks.
If there’s a bottom line to all of this, if we want OSS to continue, and be sustainable, we have to address the problems of privilege that are inherent to the way we currently do it.
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