Spotlight Excellent Idea: Synergy / Support Open Sourcing Public Code While Helping Support Techdirt

If the public funds something, it should be available to the public by default.

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"Recently, following our announcement that we have removed all Google ads and tracking code from Techdirt, a reader reached out to us with a novel (and greatly appreciated!) proposal for supporting the change and our ongoing reporting while also helping out a good cause: buying an ad — not for their own benefit, but for that of a public interest campaign that aligns perfectly with our own values. That's why you see a new banner in the sidebar on the site, encouraging our readers to sign an open letter put together by FSFE calling on the EU to pass a law requiring all publicly financed software to be made available under a free and open source license. . ."

It's not an everyday thing to do this and to bring extra attention

Support Public Code, While Helping Support Techdirt

Thu, Aug 26th 2021 11:40am — Leigh Beadon

Techdirt from the synergy dept

 

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This reader purchased the ad with their own money, as a way of helping out both Techdirt and the FSFE campaign — and we think this is such an amazing and generous idea that we wanted to call extra attention to it with a post.

We've written about this same issue of open sourcing publicly funded software in the past, when the White House began embracing the idea and then unveiled an official open source software policy — but the fact is it should be the norm for all governments that use taxpayer money to develop software. If the public funds something, it should be available to the public by default.

And, of course, we also want to call attention to this campaign as a way that you can support Techdirt. As we said in our post about removing Google trackers from the site, these kinds of reader-friendly changes also take away some of our revenue streams, and increase our reliance on you, our readers, to support us directly when and if you can. We're extremely grateful to all the readers who stepped up and gave us a tip through our Friend of Techdirt option in the Insider Shop, or engaged with one of the many other ways to support us — and now this one generous reader has showed yet another option, and one that allows you to support Techdirt and the public interest at the same time.

So we encourage everyone to sign the open letter to help demonstrate that this kind of campaign works. Moreover, if there's a campaign or an organization out there that you think aligns well with Techdirt's values and readership and that you'd like to support while helping us out in this way, please get in touch and let us know.

We don't currently have fixed rates for direct ad purchases like this, and instead prefer to come up with custom solutions that fit your budget and needs — so don't hesitate to reach out and let us know what you have in mind.

Thanks again to all our readers, and today especially to this one reader who came to us with this excellent idea!

Filed Under: ads, open code, open licensing, open source, publicly financed software
Companies: techdirt