I became interested in tech’s growing social and political influence, and the values driving its behavior, after noticing a change in sentiment in the early 2020s. Tech had shifted from primarily building and funding startups to building movements and engaging with public institutions. I wanted to understand why this was happening from a systems perspective; key events that drove this change; and how tech’s story rhymes with prior historical industry wealth booms.
I spent five years researching and writing about open source developers. My early work argued that open source code is a form of public infrastructure that requires maintenance (see Roads and Bridges: The Unseen Labor Behind Our Digital Infrastructure). My later work focused on documenting modern open source (2010s-today) as distinct from early open source (1990s-early 2000s) and drawing parallels to the creator economy (see Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software).
The experience of pursuing this topic across a few different gigs also gave me a blueprint for understanding myself as an independent researcher, a process that I’ve also tried to document in public to hopefully encourage others to do the same.
I’ve had a longtime interest in modern (post-Industrial Revolution) philanthropy. I wanted to experiment with faster grantmaking processes, as well as funding individuals rather than organizations, so I decided to make my own microgrants program.
Helium Grants were “no-strings-attached” microgrants ranging from $1K to $5K, awarded to individuals. I ran this experiment for two years, and I documented my process and learnings along the way. I also put together a few resources to encourage more people to spin up their own microgrant programs.