Messing with Open-Source 101

Yesterday I commented on an issue to share my opinion on a malicious repository. Today, I found out my comment got deleted and that the owner of the repository is essentially censoring people.

Let’s talk about this.

Constructive reply. Nice.

HacktoberFest

Once again DigitalOcean and Github organized HacktoberFest, a month long event where developers are encouraged to make open source contributions, rewarding them with a limited edition t-shirt. This is amazing, since it shows newcomers that it’s not a scary process, and gives open source projects a boost. Also very generous, because we’re talking about quite a lot of t-shirts.

Thank you, DigitalOcean and Github. And sorry for my language. I do love both of you ❤

The repository

Let’s get to business. The repository we’ll be discussing today is Hacktoberfest-Census by @Cutwell. It reads:

A census of those participating in Hacktoberfest 2017 (and an easy PR!)

So basically, it helps you get 25% of your pull requests for a free T-shirt! And boy did people respond.

Woooo, so many eager developers!

My main issue with this, is that it takes away from the initiative itself. It doesn’t serve its purpose of getting people involved in Open Source projects. What might be even worse is the type of people it attracts. Most of the merged PRs on this repository were made by users that don’t actually contribute to any real projects.

There were exceptions, of course.

Honorable mention goes to @xorgy for being self-aware.

The showdown

Now, the repository itself wasn’t enough reason to write this article. A simple issue voicing my concern would be e — oh… Someone beat me to it.

Well, that’s something.

Alright, so I decided to add a comment of my own, and a GIF to keep the mood mellow. Then someone else added their 2 cents on the subject, too. I only have an email of the latter.

In case you’re wondering, I use Spark. Awesome email client. No I’m not getting paid to say that.

Nicely phrased, to the point, thanks! Why I only have this email you (probably didn’t) ask? Well, because the author of the repository decided to delete our comments and close the issue. Cutwell censored us.

What really pushed me over the edge though, is the label Cutwell added to the issue.

For those that don’t know, this is a label used by HacktoberFest itself.

Oh, so you do know the rules?

Disappointed in the outcome, I decided to write this article and share this story. And here we are. Exciting stuff, right?

Conclusion

None, really. Just a friendly reminder that not everyone has a friendly attitude towards open source and sharing of thoughts.

Be nice to each other. And appreciate these gestures meant to make your job easier, instead of abusing it.