[IAEP] FOSS survey results 2017

[James Cameron]

On Tue, Sep 26, 2017 at 07:41:19AM -0500, Laura Vargas wrote:
> Back on April our Community was invited to take part of the Open
> Source Survey 2017.
> 
> "The Open Source Survey is an open data project by GitHub and
> collaborators from academia, industry, and the broader open source
> community."
> 
> Survey data available for download here:
> http://opensourcesurvey.org/2017/
> 
> This survey was designed by GitHub with valuable input from the
> research and open source communities.
> 
> I copy and pasted the following findings about the importance of
> documentation:
> [...]

We welcome meaningful contributions to sugar-docs and help-activity in
github.com/sugarlabs.

Also in the survey findings, privately drawn to my attention by
another Sugar Labs participant;


<quote>

Negative interactions are infrequent but highly visible, with
consequences for project activity.

Open source brings together people from all over the world, which
can lead to conflicts. While serious incidents are rare, the public
nature of open source makes negative interactions highly visible.

As a result, discouraging effects can extend far beyond the
individuals directly involved. Setting positive expectations of
behavior, and addressing negative incidents quickly, can improve
contributor retention and collaboration.

  • 18% of respondents have personally experienced a negative
    interaction with another user in open source, but 50% have
    witnessed one between other people. It's not possible to know
    from this data whether the gap is due to people who experienced
    such interactions leaving open source, or broad visibility of
    incidents. Either way, negative interactions impact many more
    than the immediate participants, so address problematic behavior
    swiftly, politely, and publicly, to send a signal to potential
    contributors that such behavior isn’t typical or tolerated.

  • By far, the most frequently encountered bad behavior is rudeness
    (45% witnessed, 16% experienced), followed by name calling (20%
    witnessed, 5% experienced) and stereotyping (11% witnessed, 3%
    experienced). More serious incidents, such as sexual advances,
    stalking, or doxxing are each encountered by less than 5% of
    respondents and experienced by less than 2% (but cumulatively
    witnessed by 14%, and experienced by 3%).

  • Negative experiences have real consequences for project
    health. 21% of people who experienced or witnessed a negative
    behavior said they stopped contributing to a project because of
    it, and 8% started working in private channels more often.

  • Tooling that allows people to address problematic behavior
    directly is the most effective way of addressing harassing
    behavior. Blocking a user was reported to be more effective than
    enforcement from third parties like maintainers, ISPs/hosting
    services, or even legal resources. Give people tools to protect
    themselves.

</quote>

-- 
James Cameron
http://quozl.netrek.org/