Matrix Seeking Tax Payer Money To Fund Future Development‽
Image Credit: The Matrix
I came across this information via @silverpill@mitra.social, who had some hard words regarding Matrix’s predicament.
But it appears as if Matrix needs help to stay fiscally afloat.
Historically, Matrix development has been largely been funded by Element, the company set up by the team who created Matrix in order to fund their work on it. As unpopular as VC funding is in some circles, the Matrix community owes a huge debt of thanks to Element's investors (Status, Notion, firstminute, Dawn, Automattic, Protocol Labs and Metaplanet) and Amdocs for funding over $50M of work on both Matrix and Element since 2017. Having a large professional team paid as their day job to maintain Matrix has helped enormously against xz-style attacks.
However, this model is simply not sustainable: these days, Element is focused on being able to pay its own costs rather than being dependent on further VC investment. This leaves a massive hole in funding for Matrix, and we've already seen the impact of this with projects like Dendrite, Low Bandwidth Matrix, Account Portability, P2P Matrix and Third Room no longer able to be funded by Element (for now). Meanwhile, the remaining core team is stretched. [...]
Particularly in the wake of the xz/liblzma attack, it seems that governments may be more aware that they and their societies depend enormously on FOSS infrastructure to operate. Free and open source software has literally become shared digital public infrastructure. And much like shared physical public infrastructure – bridges, roads, sea defences, etc – FOSS maintenance should be funded by governments on behalf of the taxpayer. (Matrix Blog)
What the Matrix team is arguing for is controversial as well as unprecedented. They desire not mere grant money (which most people would not have an issue with) but continued support at the taxpayer's expense.
However, a more significant issue is that most governments on Earth do not give out taxpayer money for free as there are sometimes unspoken requirements the receiver must adhere to for the sake of continued funding.
If Matrix were successful in receiving funds, they would burn bridges with millions of people who would suspect that governments were funding development to create back doors or “bugs” for eavesdropping.
Note: video contains language some audiences may find offensive.
Instead of seeking financial assistance from governmental authorities, maybe @matrix@mastodon.matrix.org should offer premium services for members, similar to what @element@mastodon.matrix.org offered before they dramatically raised their prices.
If Matrix offered affordable, managed hosting solutions upon custom domains, they could attract enough customers to the point where they would no longer need government support, as the latter would probably also end up as a customer.
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