Funding Open Source like public infrastructure
To protect the digital foundation of essential government services, governments should invest in Open Source as public infrastructure and shift from consumption to contribution. Fifteen years ago, I laid out a theory about the future of Open Source. In The Commercialization of a Volunteer-Driven Open Source Project, I argued that if Open Source was going to thrive, people had to get paid to work on it. At the time, the idea was controversial. Many feared money would corrupt the spirit of volunt