|
1234567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829303132333435363738394041424344454647484950515253545556575859606162636465666768 |
- title: Making Read the Docs Sustainable
- url: http://ericholscher.com/blog/2015/apr/10/making-read-the-docs-sustainable/
- hash_url: bb89afe29cd75835fd7df428b44b9759
-
- <p>Today we are announcing a <a class="reference external" href="https://readthedocs.org/sustainability/">sustainability campaign</a> to raise money for Read the Docs.
- Most of the information is available on the page there,
- but I wanted to shine a bit more light on my thinking about this process.</p>
-
- <h2>Open Source</h2>
- <p>I’ve considered myself a member of the Open Source Community for over 10 years.
- In that time,
- I’ve been influenced by a lot of projects.
- The Python and Django communities are the ones I’ve always held in the highest esteem.</p>
- <p>Django in particular is an amazing example,
- because the BDFL’s have recently <a class="reference external" href="http://www.holovaty.com/writing/bdfls-retiring/">stepped down</a> as leaders of the community.
- In my view this is the best possible outcome for a leader,
- to build such a community that they become replaceable.
- Seeing your work live on after you are done working on it is a magical thing.</p>
-
- <h2>Sustainable</h2>
- <p>I feel like Django in this context is a sustainable community.
- There are a large number of people involved in the development and ongoing maintenance.
- However,
- even with this success they recognized a need.
- They created their own <a class="reference external" href="https://www.djangoproject.com/fundraising/">fundraiser</a> to help with work that often gets missed:
- administrative and community management tasks.
- These are things that volunteers generally aren’t willing or able to do.</p>
- <p>This shows that even communities that are successful still have work that doesn’t make sense for volunteers.
- I believe Read the Docs is in a similar boat,
- though with a much less active community.</p>
- <p>Read the Docs, sadly, is still heavily dependent on me being around to operate it.
- Our campaign to make it more sustainable is the first step towards hopefully fixing this situation.
- Operating and supporting the site has started to take most of my time,
- not leaving much room for building community and onboarding contributors.
- In fact,
- it leads to an implicitly hostile environment for new contributors,
- because nobody was around to help them, test their patches, and get changes into the codebase.</p>
- <p>This has lead Read the Docs into a spiral,
- where I’m too busy to onboard new people,
- but there is an ever increasing demand for support.
- The site keeps growing larger,
- meaning there is also ever growing operational overhead.
- But the community isn’t growing,
- because there isn’t anyone there to help new people.</p>
-
- <h2>Solution</h2>
- <p>Our goal is to try and make Read the Docs more supported,
- and more welcoming to new contributors.
- With that in mind, we are raising $24,000 to allocate time for much needed user and operational support.</p>
- <p>With money injected into the system,
- operational and user support can be handled in a more consistent way.
- This will make an environment that is more welcoming to new community members,
- along with offering a better experience for existing users.</p>
- <p>If you want to see this experiment play out,
- I hope you will contribute to our <a class="reference external" href="https://readthedocs.org/sustainability/">sustainability campaign</a>.</p>
-
- <h2>Money</h2>
- <p>Read the Docs has been a labor of love,
- but it needs to transition into just labor.
- As the service has grown,
- it deserves more resources than I can dedicate to it for free.
- Introducing money lets other people do work on Read the Docs that otherwise I am left doing,
- poorly,
- because I feel a responsibility for the service.
- Having more people and money in the project will make it better for everyone.</p>
- <p>If you care about Read the Docs,
- I encourage you to get involved in the development or contribute money.
- It will make sure the service grows into something even more amazing.</p>
|