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Comment by ethin | Hacker News Reader

I don't understand this immediate reaction. What is it with people getting bitchy the moment a project starts asking for donations? Are people really that greedy that they would want something to be free forever? I mean sure, a corporation like MS might rug-pull like this (the freemium model or worse), but come on, guys, this is the Document Foundation that we're talking about. Unless I missed something massive, they have never once done anything like this, and it would be really, really weird for them to suddenly start doing this now. And they aren't the only OSS projects asking for donations, either. Are we going to crucify everyone who wants donations now?

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> What is it with people getting bitchy the moment a project starts asking for donations?

Being angry is easy and fun, and writing angry, misleading articles gets ad views.

I wonder how many of the complaints are “real” and how many are propaganda.

LibreOffice has been an alternative to MS Office for a very long time. Including when Office was quite expensive at its cheapest. I can imagine there has been plenty of anti-libreOffice seeds planted in that time that are still bearing fruit.

Donation and tip fatigue. Can't go anywhere without being bombarded with beggars. FOSS used to not have this, people got that you were supposed to have a real job to support yourself, not cultivate a discord club of beta orbiter patreon paypigs, as is the modern style.

This... Is a really weird take. Really. Maybe, just maybe, people want to dedicate full time to OSS? Maybe they can't find a job? A donation is just that, donations. Quite different, I think, from a tip, in that there is no cultural pressure to donate as there is for tips. If you don't want to donate, don't. But don't complain when people kindly ask for them. (Also, a tip (especially online ones) is very different because, unlike a tip, you actually know the donation is going towards the entity your donating too, instead of you not knowing if the tip is going to the person it should be going to or if it's going to the company operating the service.)

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