Intro
It might seem strange for a UX Designer to visit an open source conference, and honestly I wasn’t totally sure what I would find. But when I left Open Source Summit in Seattle, I felt really happy that I took a pretty big leap into new territory.
Why I Chose OSS
I chose to attend Open Source Summit cuz I was learning a lot about open source tech and didn’t understand what role design plays in that space. I was also having a difficult time connecting with people in the open source community. I believed that UX Design having space in the community could be really valuable, but whenever I reached out to owners of projects to see how I could help I never heard back. I also just got the vibe that that majority (hopefully not all) of contributions on open source projects was done by developers. It was disappointing and disheartening, but I really believed that either I was missing something or there was an untapped source of potential that the open source community could benefit more from. I decided that I wanted to try and see if either of those things were true.
Aside from that I was just getting really disenchanted with the tech landscape. Even Google, which for years I had been a mega superfan of was starting to turn sour. That’s as story for another time though.
The Experience
Thankfully I have a very supportive manager in my current role and a conference budget to help me get there. So, with that I set up all the details and headed out to Seattle. When I arrived I was definitely excited to be in Seattle cuz I really enjoy the feel of many places in the Pacific Northwest. At the conference I didn’t know what to do or how to connect with people, but I really enjoyed hearing about so many new things (and a few not new things). I was especially excited to see representation from the Open Wallet Foundation cuz I’m very excited about the potential of that project.
I really enjoyed seeing so many people connecting over so many nerdy things, and the venu space was really cool. Tons of natural light, nice conference rooms and a cool hangout space with retro arcade games and nice furniture all around.
At the end of one of the sessions they had a Q&A and I was still feeling confused about how to connect with the community and get involved as as designer. I hadn’t really connected much with anyone yet and I figured this could be my chance. So, even though I was nervous, I raised my hand and explained who I was and how I really wanted to connect with the community and get involved but didn’t know how. I asked anyone who wanted to talk more about it to come meet up with me some time during the conference. I did it!! I was definitely happy that I spoke up. Surprisingly I had 3 people talk with me after and we had some really great conversations.
2 of the people I connected with became conference buddies and we ended up spending a lot of time with each other for the remainder of the conference. One of them even had a presentation and we were all able to go and support, which was cool!
We talked a lot at the conference about what they know about getting involved when you have a skillset that’s different from a developer. I also learned a lot of about open source projects in general as they shared with me more about how their project works and how it’s supported. I really enjoyed spending time with them and learning so much.
Conclusion
I wouldn’t say that I can away from the conference with a resounding clear plan of how to get involved, but I wasn’t expecting to either. I got exactly what I wanted by connecting more with the open source community, learning about how they work and challenges they’re facing, and gaining more understanding about options I might have for getting involved. I also felt happy knowing that there’s a really strong and vibrant open source community who’s really trying to figure out how to support so many complex issues with funding, license changes, huge amounts of tech infrastructure to support, and many other things. I learned that I’m not the only one struggling to know how to get involved with open source projects and that there’s a possible future where more voices and skills can be valued in the open source community. I really hope this can be and I’m gonna keep trying to figure out how I can help build a future like that.
Leave a Reply