Thank a maintainer on us!

When it comes to open source, we came for the code, but we stayed for the people. Some of the best, brightest, & kindest people we’ve met over our years doing The Changelog are maintainers of open source software.

We’ve been working (alongside others) to support, encourage, and shine our spotlight on these amazing people for awhile now, so it was exciting to hear that our friends at GitHub and Tidelift were organizing Maintainer Week.

If you listened to our Maintainer Week episode, then you already know what this post is all about. If not, listen in to hear us invent this concept “live” on the show about 50 minutes in.

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Saying thanks

Every commit is a gift, seriously. One of the best ways to show your appreciation for a gift is by a sincere and thoughtful thank you.

So, in honor of Maintainer Week we encourage you to thank a maintainer who has improved your life with their open source gift to the world.

To join you in this, we designed a special, limited-run t-shirt that we will send to the maintainer(s) you thank, as a bonus “thank you” alongside your appreciation.

This t-shirt is 100% free for the maintainer to receive.

How to

First off, we’d love it if you say a little more than merely “thanks”. If this person has meaningfully improved your life, tell them:

• how they did that
• what that change was
• why you are thanking them

Here’s just one example, me thanking two of the folks behind this very website:

I'd like to thank @josevalim and @chris_mccord for maintaining @elixirlang and @elixirphoenix! The work you two have done over the years:

1️⃣ powers every thing we publish at @changelog
2️⃣ taught me a lot about software design
3️⃣ inspires me to write quality code

Thank you!

— Jerod Santo (@jerodsanto) June 10, 2021

Second off, make sure we know about it and we’ll hook them up with a coupon code to redeem their free shirt from our Merch Store. 💚

Where to

To keep logistics simple on our end, please thank them in one of the following places (so that we can see it).

• via GitHub Issues – be sure to mention @jerodsanto in the issue so I’m notified of the thread
• via Twitter – be sure to mention @changelog in the tweet so we see the thread (Also tag it #MaintainerWeek so others can see it)
• via Email – be sure to cc editors@changelog.com so we receive the email

When to

This is a one day only event! You need to thank the maintainer(s) you’d like to thank, today!

The GitHub Issue, Tweet, or email must be time stamped Thursday, June 10th, 2021 to qualify. This is a limited-run t-shirt and there is a limited time to qualify.

So, thank a maintainer (on us) today…right now.

If you’re reading this too late to participate… you can certainly still send your thanks to a maintainer in your life, but you’ll have to wait for the next Maintainer Week and our next limited-run t-shirt.