Permissionless Paths
Ethnographic research: mapping the minds of FOSS devs
Working in a decentralized development ecosystem takes a minute to figure out. Unlike in the education system or traditional workplaces, there’s no clear path of what you should work on, how you should work on it, and how the heck you get community buy-in.
This pilot study will strengthen our shared understanding of the motivations and challenges of open source devs. What drives productivity vs burnout?
Through in-depth qualitative interviews, the study aims to gain an understanding of open source developers’ work environment, with a focus on motivations, expectations, work habits, responsibilities, and challenges (churn, constraints).
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Themes:
- What does burnout actually look like in open source? There’s no HR, no performance reviews, no off- the-shelf solutions—so how do developers even talk about it? How do they identify it?
- How do solo open-source developers manage their time, energy, and focus? When you’re juggling deep work, community expectations, and financial uncertainty, how do you stay productive?
- What tools and systems help—or fail—when it comes to sustaining long-term contributions? What’s missing, and what should change?
Meet Our Research Team:
Laura Lotti - Lead Researcher
Researcher, analyst and writer exploring the relations between economic, technological and socio-cultural systems. Incipient interests: regenerative technocultures, mutualistic org structures, food sovereignty. When you show up for your interview, you'll be lucky enough to meet her.
Nadia Asparouhova - Advisor
Writer and researcher who explores how the internet enables individual creators. Author of Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software. AKA the only book about the humans behind open source software. We're lucky to have her on the team.
Important Note:
This study adheres to standard ethical guidelines, including informed consent, voluntary participation, confidentiality, and the right to withdraw at any time.
For more information please take a look at our privacy policy.
Questions?
Reach out to us.
hello@waye.dev→
