Wow. People are really taking this whimsical suggestion super-seriously
On 4/5/21 8:56 PM, Justin Mclean wrote:
Hi,
Other foundations such as the linux foundation do have badges for their
training courses and certification[1], but I don’t know of any that have badges
for making contributions. Openhub does track contribution and awards people a
kudos score and badges based on contribution. e.g. [2]
https://badges.fedoraproject.org/
This is the one that I referred to in my initial response.
I'd encourage folks to have a look at the kind of badges that are
available: https://badges.fedoraproject.org/explore/badges
One down side I see badges may make it harder for part time contributors as
they get less recognition. People who are paid full time to work on a project
will most likely find it easier to gain badges. While this already happens to
some extent with projects with high committer bars, it could further demotivate
people who can only contribute occassionally. This is likely to impact on the
diversity of contributors, and further increase bias. Some of this may depend
on how the badge system is designed and if it weighted more towards new
contributors or people who been around on a project for some time.
Yeah, badge systems have a big of a bootup process.
But the *point* of badges is that some people will see them as an
incentive to participate more. Awesome! And some people won't! Good for
them, too.
The other issue I see is how are the badges awarded? Automatically issuing
badges on X commits, on x mails to a mailing list, or when becoming a PMC
member or committer seems possible but is likely to be some work. For instance,
what if the person doesn’t have an apache id?
Yes. Those things. And for attending a meetup. And for helping a
stranger. And for wearing a funny hat. They're for fun, not for any kind
of serious authentication or proof of work.
Have a look at the Fedora badges. They include stuff like "Attended
Flock 2016" and "Danced with Toshio" (no, really
https://badges.fedoraproject.org/badge/dancing-with-toshio )
Some of them are more serious (first merged PR, 10th merged PR,
Contributed to Docs, that sort of thing).
Don't have an apache id and want to participate? Get an apache id. We're
not stingy with them.
Don't want to play along? Then don't! Opt out!
Depending on the badges it might also easy to game. e.g. if I need 100 commits
to get a badge, then I’m going to make lots of small commute rather than one
big one. If there a badge for emails send to lest then I’m going to send more
emails. I ‘m not sure that this would bee a positive gain for the community.
Yes, some people game it. So what? They're just for fun. They encourage
some people to achieve things that they might not otherwise. They
celebrate achievements.
I do see some merit in having badges for committership, PMC membership and the
like. These days most digital badges can be shared on linked in and other
social media platforms and doing so may help promote the ASF and how it
operates.
Thanks,
Justin
1. https://training.linuxfoundation.org/badges-2/
<https://training.linuxfoundation.org/badges-2/>
2. https://www.openhub.net/p/apache-spark/users
<https://www.openhub.net/p/apache-spark/users>
--
Rich Bowen - rbo...@rcbowen.com
@rbowen
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