# kubecon talk outline and scratch pad

abstract
No one corporation, individual, or organization can save or sustain open source. There is no sweeping solution to sustainability, as we have seen in decades of trying to maintain the commons we all depend on. Project funding, corporate support of full-time contributors, and balance in contributors’ lives are all critical to keep a large project healthy. But this isn’t all doom and gloom: we provide hope for our own future. Join Tabitha and Paris, as they discuss how your intentionality helps our sustainability. As an organization participating or an individual donating their time, how can we help each other successfully let our projects go on without us? How do mutual aid principles apply in open source? Where do corporations fit into the larger “us”? Intentional open source strategies sustain our long term needs by supporting the people

# outline
- intro
- talk about detroit water project
- people solving problems together
- this ties into mutual aid and taking action without gov intervention
- mutual aid
- community members come together to fulfill community needs: mutual == peers helping peers.
- not charity: charity == haves giving to have-nots.
- tee up / history
- include stories of oss maintainers needing things and not getting it, or asking for corps to help and not getting it
- beef (points to hit)
- how mutual aid is good actually / applied to open source
- where corporations fit in
- listen to majntianer needs
- support the ones you employ. a supported maintainer is a secure project (needs to be reworded)
- having intentional strategies for the projects they depend on and not reactionary
- conclusion

# points to hit
- oss history of maintainers drowning, pissed off, burnt out etc & companies not doing shit
- save yourselves
- dont do this alone
- emeritus should be your goal
- communicate your needs clearly and loudly
- not just to the active people who show up to your meetings
- sometimes you need to leave to save it
- the savior mindset holds us back
- knowledge is power
- understand how these structures work around you as a maintainer
- who do you ask for things and what do they do with that
- how do you effectivrly raise concerns so they are addressed for the long haul and not a quick fix
- who makes decisions on your needs?
- help from others (this is dependent on saving yourself and self care)
- project funding
- corp support of full time talent

# resources
- include paris' bookmark tweets here
- mutual aid book
- elemts of aid:
- works to meet Survival needs and build shared understanding about why people do not have what they need entersurvival needs and build shared understanding about why people do not have what they need
- mobilize people expand solidarity and build movements
- Participatory, solving problems through collective action rather than waiting for saviors
- mutual aid is not charity
- charity orgs decide who gets ehat and why but mutual aid is folks on the ground - the ones most qualifed to do the work and say their needs
- built on christian european values a long timr ago for people to pay their way into heaven - a moral hierarchy- folks thought it was the right thing to do. we currently pose open source participation like this to corporatations as "the right thing to do"
- book talks about how disasters shape action
- maybe we plug the security incidents here and how after each one a little more attention is brought about to the cause
- "scaling up" mutual aid doesnt mean bigger and centraoized it means more groups and bigger actions / shared resources
- maybe use the chart on page 61 that compares mutual aid v charity
- "most of us hace never had experience in groups w fair participatory transparent structures" - author saying this is a pitfall if most mutaul aid griups but we do jn oss! this should be a "leg up" for us
- tabby: I spend a heap of my k8s time cheerleadering/hand-holding people through the KEP process
- paris: that's your role as chair, and that's what a lot of chairs don't seem to get -- they think they're the authority
- tabby: So this is a strength of ours, but it isn't an unmitigated strength -- KEP process is way more participatory than what most folks are used to e.g. at day jobs, but it's intimidating, few people have actual experience with it

// paris notes
- maybe plug github sponsors, opencollective etc 
- nothing is perfect
- gofundme and other direct help sources provide a way for people to be clear about their beeds and others to give directly to it 
- new contributor workshops and maintainer mentoring are examples of oss mutual aid