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GitHub introduces sponsor only repositories to help developers
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For a long time open-source software developers did not have a structured and regulated manner by which they could make steady income, until they got a job with a large open-source company such as IBMs RedHat, Mulesoft, Databricks and the likes.
GitHub, a repository which was recently purchased by Microsoft, has tried to address this through a sponsor-only repository feature, where it hopes to rake in corporates and individuals to sponsor developers.
“Developers and organisations with GitHub Sponsors enabled will now be able to attach a private repository to each of their sponsorship tiers. This will grant respective funders access to the repository,” the company said in a blog post.
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It is not to say that donations for open-source projects didn’t exist, the company already had a feature where developers could add donation links to their projects. Anybody could make direct fund transfers to open-source developers, this new feature takes that to the next level.
Although the idea of sponsors-only access sounds opposite to the goal of something open-source, GitHub said that the move could be used for early access to beta testing, and also to centralised communications with sponsors through a new discussions feature. Also note that GitHub isn’t the only platform that has gone this route, live streaming service Twitch, Publishing platform Substack and others have also introduced a similar subscription feature.
Developers will also have the option to set the minimum amount for sponsorship, as well as provide custom messages.
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“The next chapter of GitHub Sponsors will pave the path for more companies to support the open-source projects they depend on. We partner with more companies each week to improve our beta program,” wrote Jessica Lord, Staff Product Manager at GitHub sponsors, in a blog post.