Dr. Dawn Foster

My friend Matt Inman made a great comic about AI…

CHAOSScast Episode 120: Practitioner Guides: #5 Demonstrating Organizational Value In this episode of CHAOSScast, Harmony Elendu hosts a discussion with Dawn Foster and Bob Killen to discuss their extensive experience in open source and detail the motivations behind the creation of the CHAOSS Practitioner Guides. These guides aim to help practitioners navigate the overwhelming amount of data related to open source projects and understand how to improve project health and sustainability. The discussion covers strategies for communicating the business value of open source efforts to leadership, framing contributions in a way that resonates with organizational priorities, and prioritizing investments in critical projects. Press download now!

CHAOSScast Episode 120: Practitioner Guides: #5 Demonstrating Organizational Value #devopsish

In addition to the CHAOSS guide about demonstrating the organizational value of your open source efforts, @mrbobbytabl.es and I recorded a podcast about it! I also have a session at OSPOlogy Lyon (Nov 5 & 6) on this same topic (registration is open & free)!
fastwonderblog.com/2025/10/07/m...

OSPOlogyLive Lyon 🇫🇷 | LF Online Community In-person Event - Join the 7th edition of OSPOlogyLive in Lyon (presentations, project workshops, and roundtable sessions) to help organizations navigate open source management, strategy, and OSPO ope...

I hope you'll join me in Lyon for the free OSPOlogyLive event on November 5 & 6! We have several CHAOSS related talks, and it's going to be a lot of fun 🎉 community.linuxfoundation.org/events/detai...

Did you know that the CHAOSS project has a working groups that anyone can participate in? Our next OSPO WG meeting is on Thursday, and we'll be talking about measuring the value of your open source efforts. Details are on the CHAOSS Calendar chaoss.community/chaoss-calen... Join us!

How do we educate the next generation of open source contributors? This is what Ruth Ikegah, Leslie Hawthorne, Stephen Walli, and I discussed at the recent #OSSummit EU in Amsterdam. Here's my blog post with a few more details along with the video of the session. fastwonderblog.com/2025/09/27/e...

I'm looking forward to attending the Digital Resilience Forum on October 29 in Madrid! I'm particularly interested in the discussions around digital sovereignty and OSS sustainability. It's free to attend, and you can request your ticket and get other details by visiting digitalresilienceforum.com

At OSSEU, I talked about power dynamics, rug pulls, and corporate impacts on OSS sustainability. The point of the talk was that OSPOs can think strategically about what the power dynamics mean and how to anticipate / mitigate the risks associated with rug pulls.

fastwonderblog.com/2025/09/18/w...

The Shifting Power Dynamics in Open Source: Rug Pulls, Relicensing and Forks - OpenUK Relicensing and forks have shifted the power dynamics across OSS.

My OpenUK blog post, The Shifting Power Dynamics in Open Source: Rug Pulls, Relicensing and Forks, just went live! I hope you enjoy it. openuk.uk/blog-shiftin...

Call for Participation is now open! – FOSS Backstage 2026 Learn about our Call for Participation and how you can become an active part of FOSS Backstage 2026.

Our Call for Participation for FOSS Backstage is now officially open!

Find all the important information you need at a glance in our new blog post.

Read the blog post: 26.foss-backstage.de...

Submit your proposal: 26.foss-backstage.de...

I wrote a blog post about how OSPOs can take a more strategic approach to conference talks based on some work that I did at previous companies to get the right people speaking at the right events, including improving talk acceptance rates.

fastwonderblog.com/2025/09/07/h...

Here's the 5th blog post in my recent series about governance. This one talks about open source project ownership along with the pros, cons, and risks associated with individual, corporate, and foundation ownership.

fastwonderblog.com/2025/08/31/g...

I'm looking forward to attending the Digital Resilience Forum on October 29 in Madrid! I'm particularly interested in the discussions around digital sovereignty and OSS sustainability. It's free to attend, and you can request your ticket and get other details by visiting digitalresilienceforum.com

This was also a fun excuse to play with Jekyll and GitHub pages to build a new website!

I've decided to do a little more consulting (in addition to CHAOSS) focused on open source strategy, contributor strategy, project governance, and similar topics. I'm only looking for short engagements. If you'd like to pay for a few hours of my time for advice or feedback, visit fastwonder.com

Humble Book Bundle: Martha Wells' Murderbot and More by TOR Fall in love with Martha Wells’ The Murderbot Diaries series—the engine behind the hit AppleTV adaptation—and help support World Central Kitchen.

Humblebundle to support World Central Kitchen, and get a bunch of my books from @tordotcom.bsky.social including Murderbot and Witch King! #booksky

www.humblebundle.com/books/martha...

It looks like it was built with lovable.

Governance.md Guide - Master Open Source Project Governance Learn how to create effective governance.md files for your open source projects. Complete guide covering the 5Ws and How of project governance.

Anyone know who's behind governance.md? They have templates, but they don't specify a license or any attribution for where the templates came from, which seems odd in the open source world.

Open Source Summit Europe 2025: Power Dynamics, Rug Pulls, and Other Cor... View more about this event at Open Source Summit Europe 2025

I'll be talking about Power Dynamics, Rug Pulls, and Other Corporate Impacts on OSS Sustainability at #OSSummit today at 4:20 in D201. I hope to see some of you there! sched.co/25VtI

I prepped our online grocery order before I left for the #OSSummit and Paul says that I somehow ordered 8 large bottles of ginger beer. So, I’m taking recommendations for not too sweet cocktails that use ginger beer 🤣

Later today! I’m looking forward to talking about Open Source Communities with @aeva.online at the Open Source Summit Europe!

Catch us at #OSSEU at 1530 if you’re interested in how we’re thinking about sustainability and continuity for Open Source Communities!

Open Source Summit Europe 2025: Panel Discussion: Educating the Next Gen... View more about this event at Open Source Summit Europe 2025

If you're here at the #OSSummit in Amsterdam, I'm on a panel about educating the next generation of open source project contributors at 11:20: sched.co/25Vmi I hope you'll join us! I'll be around all week, so you can also find me if you want some CHAOSS / OpenUK stickers, and I have a few earrings!

You know what never gets old? People in inflatable t-rex suits visiting t-rex skeletons in museums

The next post in my series about open source project governance talks about creating intentional culture with robust governance documentation that can help make your project more sustainable over time.
fastwonderblog.com/2025/08/19/g...

Ooooh, I always loved that intersection!

If you missed the OpenChain webinar where we gave an overview of the CHAOSS project, you can watch the replay to learn more about what we do and how to join us! openchainproject.org/news/2025/08...

Well, this explains why tater tots are everywhere in Oregon. In related news, I miss good tater tots 🤣

We think drinks should come with lots of snacks 😂

2 martinis with 6 nocellara olives on metal cocktail sticks topped with Kermit and a palm tree.

I spent a chunk of the day designing some new earrings / necklaces for 3D printing. Designs are online if anyone wants them: makerworld.com/en/models/17... Paul did a bunch of fish tank maintenance, so we’re rewarding ourselves with martinis while we wait for the sourdough pizza crust to rise.

So it's not just me. I was debugging some GH GraphQL api queries and getting a bunch of timeouts. Now I'll stop assuming it's my code and maybe try again tomorrow 🙄