Building FOSS is mostly rewarding and occasionally aggravating. Once in a while it requires some cleverness.
The old contract between maintainers and users was simple enough. We build the software, you use it, you report what breaks. Some of you stick around and contribute. The project gets battle-tested by people whose problems I would never have thought of, and everyone comes out ahead.
That contract is under some strain right now. Part of it is noise: AI slop, automated issues filed by agents on behalf of people who cannot describe the problem, and a general devaluing of open source by the machines spewing half-finished projects onto GH. Not all AI-written code is slop. But a lot of slop is going around.
The part that actually bothers me is quieter. A technical user can now fork a project and maintain that fork with agents indefinitely, without ever coming back. They used to need me. Now they need a subscription.
So here is the story.
