zlacker

>>jashke+(OP)
> You are responsible for your own needs. If you want things, make them.

>I am grateful for the contributions of the community. Every Clojure release incorporates many contributions. [...] Open source is a no-strings-attached gift, and all participants should recognize it as such.

>The time to re-examine preconceptions about open source is right now. Morale erosion amongst creators is a real thing.

Sad that it has to be said. I think as a creator you need to brace yourself for the reality of what it means to offer something to the world. There is a sort of normal distribution of consumers and some can be surprisingly toxic.

>>Isamu+L3
You know, I wrote a number of successful open source packages. By and large, feedback is positive, or at least utilitarian: bug reports, feature requests, questions. But there is also the occasional angry user, or, rarely, a simple thank you.

Recently, I published my first-ever commercial video game plugin. And was dumbfounded by the sheer positivity of the response. People thanked me! I got dozens of purely positive emails. I had never experienced such a thing in my Open Source work.

If we had more of that in Open Source, maybe maintainership wouldn't be such a burden.

>>Derbas+Px
I wouldn't dare writing just to say "thank you", it would feel like a no-op wasting people time. Instead, I would rather star the project on github. Did you consider those as thanks?

>>_pctq+fy
So I'll say that saying "thank you" is a highly valuable activity. It boosts people's spirits and makes them feel appreciated. Remember: we're humans and somewhat touchy feely. Gratitude is motor oil for us.

Also, tragically the world is wired to provide feedback mostly of the negative kind. This is useful to receive but also it's an unfortunate skew. Positive feedback with a few details about what is good are a hugely valuable contribution.

But if you don't have that amount of time, saying "thanks" alone is worth the keystrokes. :-)

>>johnny+QD
Sadly (well at least to me) saying "thank you" for example in a github issue is considered next to spam. You can write a long description of an issue or solution and add "thank you" but it's considered a waste to say just say "thank you" when someone sends a small PR.

I disagree with that culture. I'd prefer we all exchanged the small "thank yous" even in github threads, code review, etc... but knowing the majority seem to feel it's spam I find most of the time I feel pressure not to write them.

Maybe a few "leaders" like Linus or whoever came out with "say thank you" would help?