Flathub has positioned itself as pretty much the go-to place for Linux apps, since it works across many distributions and is even on the Steam Deck. Now, the GNOME Foundation are looking to hire someone to help expand it into a self-sustaining entity.
As posted on the Flathub Discourse Forum, the GNOME Foundation are looking to hire a contractor to help sort through management, legal and financial stuff with it being funded by Endless. This is all also being done in partnership with KDE e.V. too.
The budget for it seems pretty low though at $12,000 for an expected 3 months of part-time work on it. To me it seems a bit overly optimistic on how long this sort of thing would take to be fully sorted. Especially when you look at what the role entails like:
- Oversee deployment of payment systems for applications and direct donations to Flathub operating costs.
- Finalise governance documents and convene a simple governing body for Flathub with representatives from GNOME, KDE and the Flathub community.
- Establish and manage bank and Stripe payment processing accounts.
- Finalize and launch terms of use and developer agreements.
- Coordinate handling of accounting, operations and expenses with the GNOME Foundation.
- Ensure transparency through clear communications and documentation for the community.
Hopefully something is worked out, because Flathub has become a seriously good thing for the Linux desktop.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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5 comments
Flathub really needs to be a separate entity with backing from all major desktops and distros.
9 Likes, Who?
As to the cost . . . I dunno, that kind of thing can cost as much as you're willing to spend. Spend a little, and a couple of people will just work on it for three months. Spend a lot, and a bunch of people will have a ton of meetings, "circle back" to each other forever and so on and so forth, and what you get might not be any better.
1 Likes, Who?
Also depends on where you spend the money and how many hours are expected. In some European countries and south American countries, that's good pay for a part-time job, in some even for a full-time job.
In the US and most western European countries .. probably not.
In the US and most western European countries .. probably not.
6 Likes, Who?
ElectricPrism 3 days ago
You have to condition people to give you money.
If I was them I would have a separate service called FlatHub plus -- it could cost whatever the user choose starting at $1.00 for the first year.
This would get people to create an account and get credit card information on file -- which takes effort on their part.
They could rip off Humble Bundle and let people people decide if their $1 goes as a donation to a specific app developer, or to administration.
Registered accounts would get faster download speeds and access to VIP features similar to how Steam provides a lot of value.
(Remember the 90% off Steam Sales of 2010ish? That's how you get customers)
After the first year, and as value is created in the platform, and as customers trust has been won over in a financial exchange after a few $1 - $5 purchases start including more expensive things.
Shamelessly rip off the Steam model -- start to sell things like Affinity Photo 2 on Linux, and have a Summer and Winter sale where discounts are really good bringing more people into the platform.
Have the interior of the organization modeled after Valve with the "Bee Hive" model where potential staff self-organize into groups to accomplish tasks and then "show and tell" their progress -- entirely driven by willpower of developers and employees.
Maybe even sell something -- like optimized compiles -- like Gentoo has flags, upload your hardware specs and have your downloads personally compiled to your machines specs for maximum speed -- something like that.
This is the kind of brainstorm space I would start in. Though, their ethos may not be like this but it is a working model giving out free and premium content.
--
Edit: To add to that, have a yearly Linux App Awards where the hard work of app developers is voted on by the community and then the top performing developers get some loot, a digital award and a modest cash prize funded by the community (similar to the DOTA 2 International Prize Pool which eventually exploded to 8 million and 20 million dollars over the years given to the top 16 performing teams in various splits as the pool grew).
Call the premium service "Red Mode" or something else to distinguish it from the communal regular mode which maintains all of the community values freely to all.
Steal the rating system of ProtonDB, and have all Linux apps be ranked into compatibility categories by the users -- Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum -- this will save Linux users time when searching through the mountains of Linux Apps we have and distinguish fresh current stuff from old tech wares.
Food for though.
Last edited by ElectricPrism on 8 December 2024 at 9:04 pm UTC
If I was them I would have a separate service called FlatHub plus -- it could cost whatever the user choose starting at $1.00 for the first year.
This would get people to create an account and get credit card information on file -- which takes effort on their part.
They could rip off Humble Bundle and let people people decide if their $1 goes as a donation to a specific app developer, or to administration.
Registered accounts would get faster download speeds and access to VIP features similar to how Steam provides a lot of value.
(Remember the 90% off Steam Sales of 2010ish? That's how you get customers)
After the first year, and as value is created in the platform, and as customers trust has been won over in a financial exchange after a few $1 - $5 purchases start including more expensive things.
Shamelessly rip off the Steam model -- start to sell things like Affinity Photo 2 on Linux, and have a Summer and Winter sale where discounts are really good bringing more people into the platform.
Have the interior of the organization modeled after Valve with the "Bee Hive" model where potential staff self-organize into groups to accomplish tasks and then "show and tell" their progress -- entirely driven by willpower of developers and employees.
Maybe even sell something -- like optimized compiles -- like Gentoo has flags, upload your hardware specs and have your downloads personally compiled to your machines specs for maximum speed -- something like that.
This is the kind of brainstorm space I would start in. Though, their ethos may not be like this but it is a working model giving out free and premium content.
--
Edit: To add to that, have a yearly Linux App Awards where the hard work of app developers is voted on by the community and then the top performing developers get some loot, a digital award and a modest cash prize funded by the community (similar to the DOTA 2 International Prize Pool which eventually exploded to 8 million and 20 million dollars over the years given to the top 16 performing teams in various splits as the pool grew).
Call the premium service "Red Mode" or something else to distinguish it from the communal regular mode which maintains all of the community values freely to all.
Steal the rating system of ProtonDB, and have all Linux apps be ranked into compatibility categories by the users -- Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum -- this will save Linux users time when searching through the mountains of Linux Apps we have and distinguish fresh current stuff from old tech wares.
Food for though.
Last edited by ElectricPrism on 8 December 2024 at 9:04 pm UTC
0 Likes
I completely agree with the goals, i do think that at 12,000USD it's very underfunded. I think they need to raise some capital first before doing this.
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