At the UN Open Source Conference, I joined a breakout session on funding open source. 

We discussed tensions between current funding models, sustainability, and incentives with maintainers from Python Software Foundation, Processing Foundation, Linux devs, etc

I brought up crypto...and things got interesting... ↴

cultivating sovereignty and stewardship // one must imagine Sisyphus happy // https://fevenm.substack.com // https://x.com/notfeven

First takeaway:

Sporadic funding = stalled momentum.

Many OSS projects lack consistent financial support, making it hard to plan for long-term stewardship, security, or growth.

Government grants: what used to be consistently reliable is now very risky due to administrative cuts and shifting political climate. 

Several projects have shared that the grants that they were promised have now been cut and are now scrambling to meet needs.

Corporate sponsorship often skews priorities. Maintainers shared stories of feeling pressured to prioritize features requested by enterprise sponsors over what might actually be better for the project's long-term health, sustainability, or security.

The incentive misalignment is persistent among projects.

We discussed funding types like:
→ Corporate sponsorship
→ Government grants
→ Civic tech & philanthropy
→ Consumer donations
→ Paid features
→ Crypto

Each model has tradeoffs.