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by thefurman
2435 days ago
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I think one of the problems people have with free open source in general is that it's hard to get a bearing on exactly what additional risks come with it now and in the future. Will it stay open source and free to use?
Will it be actively maintained?
Can I get support for issues in a timely manner?
Will someone be there to helpfully guide or at least review and accept my contributions? There needs many more dimensions to the categorization and it would be very nice if OSS projects could be graded along them all. |
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This is a concern of mine as well, so when I find a repo I want to guarantee future access to, I fork it. Then I have a copy that's licensed with the original open source license and which will stick around as long as I care to keep it around.
>Can I get support for issues in a timely manner?
IMO this should not be an expectation in open source. It's nice when it happens, but expect to DIY.
>Will someone be there to helpfully guide or at least review and accept my contributions?
Also nice when it happens, also by no means guaranteed in open source. If someone else isn't available, you can always carry on in your own fork.
Overall I think people place certain expectations on FOSS because they tend to align with the open source culture but strictly speaking, the reality of FOSS doesn't support those expectations in the long term.