Philanthropic Software Development
I love to code, and I'd like to make a contribution. HP had
a project (SourceXchange) for commercial match-making
between developers and their sponsors, my dream is one that
matches charities with their programming benefactors. I
asked the manager of HP's effort if they'd expand it to
include work "gratis," but they declined.
It makes a lot of sense to me, but maybe I'm just dense.
I don't like the idea of giving away something I've done to
just any angst-ridden prick that happens upon it. Hence my
refusal to participate in the open source movement.
I am charitable. I make gifts of money where it is needed,
and will continue to do so. But Giving money feels very
hollow. I want to give something substatntive, but all I
know is engineering. I insist on continuing to work the
private sector because I'm very productive, and that
productivity (I hope) trickles down to the rest of the
world over time.
I have seen the struggles that charities endure for sake of
cause. Good, purpose-designed software can help them, even
the smallest of them, to do what they do better. It can
help them spend more time on the cause, and less time
administering. That would be a worthwhile contribution, and
is something that really excites me.
So, over the next few days I'm going to hash out my ideas
on the subject here and hope some like-minded people read
them, agree and join me. Or, maybe less ambitiously, help
me refine my thoughts to form a plausable argument.
Let's leave the world a better place.