I’m thankful for the STF. Germany is one of the few countries doing something. But it is not strategic software-development.

    * They don’t employ software-developers. No safety for the developers. No control over developers.
    * It is only temporary.
    * The projects need to apply repeatingly for funding. Wasting time and resources and chausing worries.

The how planet needs Linux, BSD, cURL, ffmpeg, Flatpak. We need to ensure that this work for the people.

We feed for 30 years constantly money into monopolies. We shall feed the next century constantly money into things the people need.

Many developers of Linux and GCC are paid. Because companies decided it is necessary.

▲ eigenspace an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I don't really agree here. I think what they are doing is pretty strategic, especially given the relatively limited money they have.

There's basically two sides to funding software that are actually rather different

   1. Accelerator phase: getting the software to a point where it can reasonably replace some foreign closed source enterprise option (i.e. feature devlopment). This sort of thing is often highly speculative. It should be project based, with concrete deliverables, and done with a non-permanent grant. If things go reasonably well, then there can be followup grants. This is what the STA focuses on, and is a major gap in the FOSS world.

   2. Established phase: Once the software is actually ready for adoption (thanks to help from the STA!), and gets integrated into government functions, then the agencies that *use* the software should be setting up enterprise support contracts that give long-term support and stability to the projects they've adopted. A good example of this would be Nextcloud who has multiple such contracts with different parts of Germany (also other European organizations). This part is better off being done by the agency that *uses* the software, rather than having the STA do it. Some of these agencies do in fact also have internal software developers that work on Nextcloud.

I don't think it's a shortcoming of the STA that they're focused on point 1 rather than point 2, I think if they were forced to do both, they'd actually be less effective at what they're doing.

The STA is basically trying to fill the role that venture capital plays in getting a startup ready to take on customers, except the STA doesn't take an ownership stake, and they focus on FOSS.

▲ nwellnhof 23 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> They don’t employ software-developers.

They actually do employ developers: https://www.sovereign.tech/programs/fellowship

> The projects need to apply repeatingly for funding.

Still better than no funding at all.

▲ trentor an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A single percentage of the revenue google generated by using ffmpeg would fund development indefinitely.

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blitzar an hour ago | parent [-]

A single percentage of the food budget for the google private jets would fund ffmpeg development indefinitely.

	▲	throw939494i4 33 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		It would be enough if software donated to software development actually went to developers. Not to foundation CEOs and bs actovism!

▲ repelsteeltje 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Well put.

Would it make more sense if this Sovereign Tech Agency behaved less like a Sovereign Tech Fund and simply hired the developers? Or is civil servants developing OSS commodities too much of a heresy?

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oytis an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> is civil servants developing OSS commodities too much of a heresy

I see two problems here for Germany. First, the salaries of civil servants are regulated, and might be not what most developers, even German ones, expect. In addition civil servant status is bundled with privileges and duties that make it painful to lay it down. Most developers are used to job flexibility though, especially as, as I said, the salaries are not going to be great.

Second, there is a decision by the Constitutional Court that prohibits the state from competing with the market. Temporary grants to independent actors are among other things a way to work around it.

	▲	repelsteeltje an hour ago \| parent [-]
		The first part boils down to any civil servant: inflexibility and lower wages aren't for everyone, but it should not be impossible to attract talent intrinsically motivated to contribute to public cause. Especially when it's OSS. The second part is a bit closer to the heresy angle: new public management forbids competing with "free market". Of course, many EU governments have always found and used all kinds of loopholes to support "independent enterprises" like railways, airlines, power companies and banks once they become too big to fail. Maybe commodity open source software has reached that level too...

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ximm an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

There is also the option of structural funding (Strukturförderung in german) where important organizations receive multi-year contracts instead of short term project funding.

▲ sdcfgy 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Well said.

On your last point, I'd love one day to see that OSS developers are paid because society benefits from their work.

▲ jimbob45 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

We do all this self-congratulation around funding OSS companies and then end up with OSS companies that exist only thanks to government subsidization. Why? Isn’t governmental control over funding what we hate about Microsoft? What is so bad about letting real customers decide which companies need funding?

	▲	SwellJoe 20 minutes ago \| parent \| next [-]
		"Isn’t governmental control over funding what we hate about Microsoft?" No. And, I'm confused why you'd think that's the problem "we" have with Microsoft or any other monopolist.
	▲	hvb2 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		> What is so bad about letting real customers decide which companies need funding? Because human nature means you won't get paid when something is free. There's donate options but those are not a reliable source of money. Unless your software is big enough that you can make money through support contracts, I don't see how you can keep the lights on while being paid