# Open-Source Income & Status: A Systems-Programmer Playbook

Target reader: a systems-focused developer (C, C++, Bash, Python, learning Rust/Lua/Scala/Haskell) who wants money plus standing in the Linux kernel, BSD, Plan 9, and suckless orbits. The aim is a paid permanent-maintainer slot on something that matters, with grant money, sponsorships, and conference status layered on top.

---

## 1. Funding Mechanisms

How money actually moves to OSS individuals.

### GitHub Sponsors
- URL: https://github.com/sponsors
- Apply: https://github.com/sponsors/signup
- Fees: 0% from GitHub; payment processor fees pass through.
- Reality: Median sponsored dev earns under $20/month. The few who clear $5k+/month are project leads with massive corporate dependency footprint (Evan You pre-Vue Inc, Sindre Sorhus, Caleb Porzio, antirez). Systems devs who do well: Daniel Stenberg (curl, but mostly via wolfSSL salary, not Sponsors), Drew DeVault (~$5k/mo across platforms), Andrew Kelley (Zig, via Zig Software Foundation pass-through).
- Strategy: useful as a tip jar and as social proof; not a primary income stream.

### Open Collective
- URL: https://opencollective.com
- Fiscal-host model: a non-profit holds the funds for your project so you can take corporate sponsorship without incorporating.
- Used heavily by collective projects (Webpack, Babel, Bevy, Vue). Less common for solo systems devs.
- Useful when you want corporates to expense-report-pay you and you don't have an LLC.

### Tidelift
- URL: https://tidelift.com
- Model: enterprises pay Tidelift for "managed open source"; Tidelift pays maintainers of the packages those enterprises depend on. Maintainer must commit to security response, EOL transparency, license clarity.
- Sweet spot: a package with hundreds of thousands of enterprise downloads. PyPI/Maven/npm/RubyGems heavy.
- Income: $0 to ~$3-5k/mo per package, very long tail. Systems libraries (libfoo on glibc) are not the target. Skip unless you maintain a popular language-ecosystem package.

### Polar.sh
- URL: https://polar.sh
- Model: GitHub-native funding + issue bounties + subscription tiers + paid posts. Pivoted in 2024 toward "monetization layer for devs," now offers paid releases and license keys.
- Better than GitHub Sponsors for converting GitHub-issue-watchers into paying users.

### Algora.io
- URL: https://algora.io
- Bounty marketplace. Companies post bounties on GitHub issues, you solve them, you get paid. Typical bounty $50-$2000, occasional $5k+.
- Top hunters clear $5-10k/month sustained, but they treat it like a job.
- Strong in Rust, Go, TS. Has bounties on Tauri, Trigger.dev, Cal.com, ZIO, Twenty. Systems-level bounties are rarer but exist.

### Patreon / Ko-fi
- Ko-fi (https://ko-fi.com) takes 0% on tips, 5% on shop sales. Patreon (https://patreon.com) takes 8-12%.
- Both work for "audience-funded" devs (blog readers, conference attendees) rather than pure code maintainers.

### Direct Corporate Sponsorship
- The actual high-leverage path. A company that depends on your code pays you a retainer ($2k-$20k/mo) to keep maintaining it.
- Pattern: cultivate one or two corporate users who would be screwed if you stopped. Send them an invoice through your LLC or fiscal host.
- Examples: Cloudflare paying maintainers of dependencies, Stripe Open Source program, Sentry FOSS Fund ($500k/year, 8-9 picks).
- How to position: become "the person who answers issues on $LIBRARY within 24h" so the budget-holder's calculus is "$5k/mo retainer < one engineer-week of internal forking."

### Anonymous tipping (Bitcoin / Lightning / Monero)
- Used because:
  1. International donors avoid card-network friction and FX fees.
  2. Maintainers in sanctioned countries (Russia, Iran) can still receive.
  3. Some communities (suckless, cat-v.org, Tor) explicitly prefer non-surveillance payments.
- Tools: BTCPay Server (self-hosted), Strike, Alby (Lightning addresses like you@getalby.com).
- Volume is small (~5-10% of total income for those who accept), but symbolically important to that crowd.

---

## 2. Grant Programs (the actual gold for systems work)

Non-dilutive money. Apply early, apply often. These are ordered by relevance to a Linux/BSD/Plan 9-flavored profile.

| Program | Country | Typical size | What they fund | URL |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sovereign Tech Agency (STA, formerly STF) | Germany | €50k - €1M | Critical digital infrastructure (curl, OpenSSH, Sequoia-PGP, GNU coreutils, OpenPGP.js) | https://www.sovereign.tech |
| NLnet (NGI0 / NGI Zero) | EU | €5k - €100k | Privacy, decentralization, infrastructure; very flexible | https://nlnet.nl |
| Prossimo (ISRG) | US | salary-funded | Memory-safe systems: Rust-for-Linux, Rustls, sudo-rs, rav1d | https://www.memorysafety.org |
| OpenSSF Alpha-Omega | US | $100k - $1M+ | Top 10k OSS critical projects: security audits, hardening | https://openssf.org/community/alpha-omega |
| LF Mentorship | Global | $6k stipend / term | 12-week mentored work on an LF project | https://wiki.linuxfoundation.org/lfx/mentorship |
| Mozilla MOSS | Global | $5k - $250k | Status: largely dormant since 2023, occasional targeted rounds | https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/moss/ |
| Google Open Source Peer Bonus | Global | $250 cash | Recognition awards; nominated by Googlers | https://opensource.google/documentation/reference/growing/peer-bonus |
| Microsoft FOSS Fund | Global | $10k pick | Employees nominate, vote monthly | https://github.com/microsoft/foss-fund |
| Sentry FOSS Fund | Global | $500/$5k per pick | Quarterly grants, dependency-focused | https://blog.sentry.io/sentry-2025-foss-fund/ |
| NSF POSE | US | $300k Phase I, $1.5M Phase II | Open-source ecosystem sustainability (org formation around an existing OSS project) | https://new.nsf.gov/funding/opportunities/pose-pathways-enable-open-source-ecosystems |
| DARPA (V-SPELLS, HARDEN, AIE) | US | $500k - $5M | Memory safety, formal verification, autonomous patching | https://www.darpa.mil/research/programs |
| NASA / NSF SBIR | US | $50k - $1M | If you can wrap your OSS work in a small business | https://www.sbir.gov |

### Sovereign Tech Agency (formerly Sovereign Tech Fund)
The most relevant single program for a systems dev. Funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs. As of 2024 it became the Sovereign Tech Agency under DIZ.
- Notable grants: curl ($195k in 2024), GNU coreutils (€202k), OpenSSH (€203k), Sequoia-PGP, FFmpeg (€157k), Reproducible Builds, Wireguard, RubyGems, systemd.
- Bug Resilience Program funds maintenance, not just new features.
- Process: apply via https://www.sovereign.tech/programs — open intake plus targeted calls. Decisions take ~3-6 months. You need a clear scope (deliverables, timeline) and proof you actually maintain the project.
- Realistic for a contributor: get to be a recognized sub-maintainer on a covered project, then propose a sub-scope (e.g. "I will harden subsystem X for 6 months at €40k").

### NLnet / NGI Zero
- Funded by EU NGI initiative. Multiple sub-funds: NGI0 Core, NGI0 Commons, NGI0 Entrust, NGI0 Review, NGI Mobifree, NGI Zero Search.
- Calls open every 2 months. Application is short (4 pages typed answers, not a 60-page grant). They prefer applicants with existing track record but accept first-timers.
- Typical grant €5k-€50k for a 6-12 month project. Up to €100k for larger work packages.
- Funded projects relevant here: 9pfs work, Plan9 ports, lots of decentralized infra, Wayland tools, BSD security work.
- Apply: https://nlnet.nl/propose
- This is the easiest non-trivial OSS grant to actually win for a solo systems person.

### Prossimo (ISRG / Let's Encrypt parent)
- URL: https://www.memorysafety.org
- Focus: memory-safe rewrites of foundational C code. Funded Rustls, sudo-rs, ntpd-rs, Rust-for-Linux core support, rav1d.
- They directly hire engineers (Filippo Valsorda was an advisor here). Path in: ship serious Rust-for-Linux work, get noticed by Josh Aas / Daniel Stenberg.
- Funded by Cisco, Google, Amazon, Fastly, Open Society Foundations.

### OpenSSF Alpha-Omega
- URL: https://openssf.org/community/alpha-omega
- Funds the top ~10k critical OSS projects (per Census II) for security improvements.
- Grants of $100k-$1M to projects like Python, Rust, Node, Eclipse, OpenJS Foundation.
- You don't apply solo; you apply as the project's lead/maintainer.

### Linux Foundation Mentorship (LFX)
- URL: https://lfx.linuxfoundation.org/tools/mentorship/
- $6,600 stipend per 12-week term. Hundreds of slots per year. Projects include Linux kernel, Hyperledger, Cloud Native (k8s, CNCF), Yocto, LF Energy.
- Pathway: do LFX → get noticed by the mentor (who is usually employed by Red Hat/Intel/Google) → get hired or recommended.
- Best entry point for a serious kernel ambition without an existing corporate sponsor.

### Plan 9 Foundation
- The "Plan 9 Foundation" as a formal funding entity does not really exist with grant programs. There is a Bell-Labs-derived Plan 9 Foundation that holds the trademark and copyright (https://p9f.org), but it does not issue grants.
- Funding for Plan 9 work in practice comes via NLnet, GSoC (when 9front participates), and the 9front community's informal donations.

### BSD Foundations
| Foundation | Url | What they do |
|---|---|---|
| FreeBSD Foundation | https://freebsdfoundation.org | ~$2M/year budget, ~12 employees, funds contracted development (security, ZFS, networking). Job board at https://freebsdfoundation.org/our-work/job-openings/ |
| OpenBSD Foundation | https://www.openbsdfoundation.org | ~$300-500k/year, mostly hardware + hackathons. Does not hire devs; pays expenses. |
| NetBSD Foundation | https://www.netbsdfoundation.org | Smaller budget, occasional contracted work, GSoC participation. |

Reality on BSD work: the foundations themselves don't have many salaried slots, but their corporate sponsors (Juniper, Netflix for FreeBSD, etc.) do hire BSD committers. Becoming a `src` committer on FreeBSD is the prerequisite.

### NSF Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems (POSE)
- URL: https://new.nsf.gov/funding/opportunities/pose-pathways-enable-open-source-ecosystems
- Phase I: $300k for 18 months to scope an OSS ecosystem org. Phase II: $1.5M for 2 years to build it.
- US-affiliated PIs only (you can be the technical lead through a university or non-profit fiscal sponsor).
- Recent awards have gone to Polars, RAPIDS, BPF/eBPF community work, scientific Python.

---

## 3. Companies That Hire Full-Time OSS Maintainers

| Company | Hires for | Remote? | Comp (USD) | Apply |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Igalia | Chromium, WebKit, Mesa, V8, GStreamer, Linux gfx, Servo | Fully remote, worker co-op | €60k-€120k EUR equivalent (flat structure) | https://www.igalia.com/jobs/ |
| Collabora | Linux kernel (DRM, media), Wayland, GStreamer, Panfrost, Mesa | Mostly remote | $90k-$180k | https://www.collabora.com/careers/ |
| Red Hat / IBM | Kernel, glibc, GCC, systemd, Wayland, podman, Fedora | Hybrid/remote | $130k-$280k+ | https://redhat.com/jobs |
| SUSE | Kernel, btrfs, openSUSE, Rancher | Remote-friendly | $110k-$220k | https://jobs.suse.com |
| Canonical | Kernel, Ubuntu, Snap, MAAS, Mir | Fully remote, ~50 countries | $80k-$200k (geo-adjusted, on the low side) | https://canonical.com/careers |
| Linaro | ARM Linux, OpenEmbedded, OP-TEE, EDK2 | Remote | $90k-$170k | https://www.linaro.org/careers/ |
| AdaCore | Ada/SPARK toolchain, formal verification, GNAT | Remote (US/EU) | $100k-$180k | https://www.adacore.com/company/careers |
| Tweag (Modus Create) | Haskell, Nix, Bazel | Remote EU/NA | €70k-€130k | https://modus.app/careers (Tweag brand still recruited) |
| Galois | Haskell, formal methods, security, Rust | US-only (clearance friendly) | $130k-$220k | https://galois.com/careers/ |
| Well-Typed | GHC, Cabal, Haskell consulting | Remote EU/NA | £50k-£100k+ | https://www.well-typed.com/jobs |
| Embecosm | GCC, LLVM, RISC-V toolchains | Remote (UK base) | £45k-£90k | https://www.embecosm.com/jobs/ |
| Kitware | CMake, VTK, ITK, ParaView | Hybrid (NY/NC/France) | $90k-$170k | https://www.kitware.com/careers/ |
| Codethink | Low-level Linux, automotive Linux, BuildStream, Trustable | UK/EU remote | £45k-£110k | https://www.codethink.co.uk/careers.html |
| Sourceware / SFC | glibc, GDB, binutils, GCC infra | Project-funded, varies | n/a (mostly project hosting) | https://sourceware.org |
| Oxide Computer | Illumos, Hubris (Rust embedded), service processors | Remote US | $200k flat salary | https://oxide.computer/careers |
| Ferrocene / Ferrous Systems | Rust toolchain for safety-critical | Remote EU | €70k-€120k | https://ferrous-systems.com/jobs/ |
| System76 | Pop!_OS, COSMIC (Rust), firmware | US remote | $90k-$160k | https://system76.com/careers |
| Cloudflare | Linux kernel TCP, BPF, Rust, networking | Remote-friendly | $150k-$300k+ | https://www.cloudflare.com/careers/ |
| Meta / Google / Microsoft kernel teams | Linux kernel (scheduler, fs, BPF), Rust-for-Linux | Hybrid | $250k-$600k+ TC | their respective careers sites |

### The standouts for Kris's profile

- **Igalia**: worker cooperative, no internal hierarchy, fully open about pay, very pro-OSS. Their consulting model is the platonic ideal of "OSS company." If you ship Mesa or kernel graphics work, this is the obvious target.
- **Collabora**: similar shape, more kernel-graphics and embedded heavy. Hires aggressively from the upstream contributor pool.
- **Oxide Computer**: Illumos kernel work + Rust embedded firmware. Flat $201,227 USD salary, no negotiation. Bryan Cantrill, Adam Leventhal, Steve Klabnik, Jess Frazelle. Cultural fit for someone who likes Plan 9-ish design.
- **Sourceware Project** (Software Freedom Conservancy fiscal sponsor): if you want to live inside glibc/GDB/binutils long-term, contribute and then look for funded slots through Red Hat or Suse.

People worth following / cold-emailing:
- Greg Kroah-Hartman (kernel stable, Linux Foundation Fellow) — mentors maintainers
- Miguel Ojeda (Rust-for-Linux, Prossimo)
- Drew DeVault (sr.ht, controversial but central in suckless/cat-v orbit)
- Jens Axboe (Meta, io_uring) — accepts patches generously
- Jonathan Corbet (LWN editor, kernel maintainer)
- Theo de Raadt (OpenBSD) — different culture, slow trust building
- Bryan Cantrill (Oxide, formerly Sun/Joyent) — public hiring posts on his blog/Twitter

---

## 4. Permanent Maintainer Paths on Flagship Projects

| Project | Maintainer count | Typical path in | Who pays today |
|---|---|---|---|
| Linux kernel (subsystem) | ~1,700 listed in MAINTAINERS | Trivial patch → driver fix → driver maintainership → subsystem | ~95% Red Hat / Intel / Google / Meta / SUSE / Linaro / Oracle / IBM |
| Rust-for-Linux | ~15 core | Direct contribution, accepted via Miguel Ojeda | Google, Prossimo, Microsoft |
| systemd | ~30 active | Patches via GitHub, Lennart's review | Red Hat, Microsoft (Lennart now) |
| OpenZFS | ~20 active | Patches, OpenZFS Leadership Committee invites | iXsystems, Klara, Datto |
| btrfs | ~10 core | Lots of test patches, Josef Bacik mentor | Meta, SUSE |
| GCC | ~250 write access | Sustained patches, GCC steering committee invitations | Red Hat, SUSE, Embecosm, AdaCore |
| LLVM/Clang | ~1000+ commit access | Phabricator/PRs, area maintainer role over time | Apple, Google, Sony, ARM, Intel, Embecosm |
| 9front (Plan 9 fork) | ~5-10 active hackers (cinap_lenrek, sigrid, kvik, qwx) | Mailing list, IRC #cat-v on OFTC, commits via hjfs/git9 | Volunteer, occasional NLnet |
| plan9port | Russ Cox + small group | GitHub PRs, very high quality bar | Volunteer (Russ is at Google) |
| FreeBSD src | ~250 src committers | "Bugbusting" → reviewed patches → mentor sponsors commit bit | FreeBSD Foundation contracts + Netflix/Juniper/iX |
| OpenBSD | ~140 committers | Slow trust, hackathon attendance, theo's invitation | Volunteer + Foundation; some via M:Tier, Esdenera |
| NetBSD | ~250 committers | pkgsrc → src commit | Volunteer + sponsors |
| GHC (Haskell) | ~30 active | Trac tickets → MRs → GHC Steering | Well-Typed, IOG (Cardano), Tweag, Obsidian Systems |
| Cabal | ~10 core | PRs, Haskell Foundation board oversight | Haskell Foundation grants, Well-Typed |
| Lua core | 3 (Roberto Ierusalimschy, Luiz de Figueiredo, Waldemar Celes) | Closed core; ecosystem (LuaRocks, OpenResty) is open | Tecgraf/PUC-Rio (academic) |
| LuaJIT | Mike Pall (semi-retired), now community fork at openresty | Maintain a fork; very thin pickings | OpenResty, CloudFlare |
| Scala | Lightbend + Scala Center (EPFL) | EPFL Scala Center has open positions | Lightbend, EPFL, VirtusLab |
| Rust Project | ~120 team members across teams | Working group → team membership via existing team vote | ~50% employed by Rust Foundation members |
| NixOS | ~150 committers | RFCs, PRs, "nixpkgs commit bit" via existing committers | Tweag, Determinate Systems, Numtide, Flox |
| Guix | ~75 committers | Long mailing-list track record, FSF-aligned | Mostly volunteer + NLnet |

### Linux kernel pathway (the canonical one)
1. Read `Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst`.
2. Subscribe to a subsystem list (linux-fsdevel, linux-block, linux-rt, etc.). Pick one matching your interest. For Kris's profile: probably DRM/graphics, RT, or a driver subsystem.
3. Fix trivial bugs (checkpatch warnings don't count). Look at staging trees with broken drivers; Greg KH explicitly maintains `staging/` as a graveyard for newcomer-friendly cleanup.
4. After ~20-30 accepted patches, take on a real feature. Become co-maintainer (`MAINTAINERS` entry marked with you as M: or R:).
5. The LWN article series "How to participate in the Linux community" (https://lwn.net/Articles/HowToParticipate/) is the gold standard.
6. Linux Foundation Mentorship → LFX kernel internships are explicitly the corporate-recruited pipeline.

### The "almost universal" rule
Per Greg KH's 2017+ KS reports and yearly LF reports, ~95% of kernel patches come from people paid to write them. Becoming a maintainer without a paycheck is possible but rare; the path is "become good enough that a company hires you to keep doing it."

---

## 5. Status-Building in These Communities

### Conferences (with realistic talk-acceptance bars)

| Conference | Where/when | Focus | CFP closes | URL |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FOSDEM | Brussels, late Jan/Feb | Everything FOSS; has Plan 9 devroom (sporadically) and BSD, kernel, distro, language devrooms | Nov | https://fosdem.org |
| Linux Plumbers Conf | Sept, various cities | Kernel subsystem and userland integration | May | https://lpc.events |
| USENIX ATC + OSDI | Annual rotation | Systems research, papers + invited talks | Variable | https://www.usenix.org |
| BSDCan | Ottawa, June | All BSD | March | https://www.bsdcan.org |
| EuroBSDCon | Europe, Sept | All BSD | May | https://eurobsdcon.org |
| AsiaBSDCon | Tokyo, March | All BSD | Dec | https://asiabsdcon.org |
| Kernel Recipes | Paris, Sept | Curated kernel talks; invitation-leaning | June | https://kernel-recipes.org |
| IWP9 (International Workshop on Plan 9) | Annual, small | Plan 9 / 9front / Inferno research | Variable | https://iwp9.org (and 9p.io) — historically rotates between US/EU |
| Haskell Implementors' Workshop | Co-located with ICFP, Sept | GHC and compiler implementation | June | https://www.haskell.org/community.html |
| Strange Loop | Discontinued in 2023 | RIP | — | — |
| !!Con | NYC, May | Short joyful systems talks; easy entry point | Feb | https://bangbangcon.com |
| Recurse Center talks / NYC Systems | Informal | Easy networking | rolling | https://www.recurse.com |
| SCaLE (Southern California Linux Expo) | Pasadena, March | Big tent Linux | Nov | https://socallinuxexpo.org |
| 9front summit / "Bell Labs reunion" type events | Ad hoc | Plan 9 inner circle | — | watch 9front.org/news |

### LWN.net writing
- LWN pays for articles. Jake Edge / Jonathan Corbet have published outside contributors.
- Rate: ~$0.20-0.30/word historically (last published; current rates negotiated case-by-case).
- A single well-placed LWN piece is worth more for status than 50 blog posts.
- Pitch: jake.edge@lwn.net or corbet@lwn.net. They want technical depth, not opinion.

### Blogs in the orbit
- cat-v.org — Uriel's legacy, "considered harmful" essays. Plan 9 / suckless aesthetic.
- drewdevault.com — controversial but central voice in this culture.
- 9fans archives + 9front.org/news.
- Lobsters (https://lobste.rs) is where this crowd discusses. Hacker News works but Lobsters is closer to the suckless/BSD culture. Need an invite — find someone in the tree.

### Newsletter editorship
- Kris's `ninetimes.org` plan is exactly this lever. A respected community newsletter elevates you to "convener" status, which is even higher than "contributor" status. See LWN's example: Corbet built LWN into the kernel community's record of truth.

### Foundation boards
- Election to the Free Software Foundation, OpenBSD Foundation, FreeBSD Foundation, Software Freedom Conservancy, Haskell Foundation, Rust Foundation Project Director seat — these come after 5-10 years of contribution. Worth tracking but not a near-term lever.

---

## 6. Bounty Platforms

| Platform | Focus | Typical payout | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Algora.io | Generic OSS bounties; Rust/Go/TS heavy | $50-$5,000 | Most active currently. https://algora.io |
| Polar.sh | GitHub issue bounties + subscriptions | $20-$2,000 | Now broader monetization. https://polar.sh |
| Gitcoin | Web3-heavy bounties + grants | $100-$50k | Mostly Ethereum ecosystem. https://www.gitcoin.co |
| Issuehunt | Generic GitHub issues | $20-$500 | Quiet but alive. https://issuehunt.io |
| Bountysource | Mostly defunct | — | Avoid; payouts have been frozen historically. |
| huntr.com (Protect AI) | Security bounties for OSS | $50-$4,000 | CVE-focused OSS security. https://huntr.com |
| immunefi | Web3 security | $1k-$1M+ | Specialized in crypto, very high payouts but high effort |

For a systems profile, Algora and huntr are the realistic ones. A skilled C/C++ dev can clear $2k-$5k/month on huntr finding memory safety issues in OSS projects.

---

## 7. The Plan 9 / Suckless / cat-v Ecosystem

### 9front
- Active fork of Plan 9 from Bell Labs. Repo + ML at http://9front.org and shithub.us (their git host).
- Active maintainers (as of 2025): cinap_lenrek, sigrid, kvik, qwx, kemal, mischief.
- Plug in: lurk #cat-v on OFTC IRC and 9fans (https://9fans.topicbox.com). The community is small enough that consistent presence (months) + a few good patches gets you commit access.
- Active workstreams: AMD64 hardening, USB stack, ndb improvements, drawterm-cocoa.

### plan9port (Russ Cox)
- https://github.com/9fans/plan9port
- Russ accepts PRs personally. Very high standard. Maintainer co-leads: Fazlul Shahriar (David), Anthony Martin (formerly), David du Colombier (9legacy too).
- Sub-project: Acme tooling, p9p ports of mk, rc, etc.

### Inferno
- http://www.vitanuova.com/inferno/ — semi-abandoned commercial branch.
- Hosted at https://github.com/inferno-os/inferno-os — minimal recent activity.
- Status-building leverage: low. Nostalgia value high.

### Suckless
- https://suckless.org, mailing list at https://lists.suckless.org/.
- Effectively run by Anselm R. Garbe (anselm) and Laslo Hunhold (LH). Decisions via consensus on the dev list + occasional Suckless Conf (slcon) in Germany.
- Source: git://git.suckless.org (their own server) and shadowed on https://git.suckless.org.
- Plugging in: dwm patches mailing list, send well-tested patches that respect the LOC budget. anrxc, Markus Teich, Hiltjo Posthuma are active.
- Status here transfers across the cat-v/Plan9 orbit because of shared cultural roots.

### cat-v.org
- Uriel's project; he passed away in 2012. Now maintained by surviving 9front/suckless friends.
- Quotes, "considered harmful" essays, mirrored Plan 9 docs.
- Less a "contribute here" target, more a cultural marker — if your name is associated with cat-v style writing, the community recognizes it.

### Drew DeVault
- Runs sr.ht (https://sr.ht), wrote aerc, scdoc, Hare (language), helped found Sway/wlroots.
- Controversial in tone (public spats with Linus, Theo, etc.) but the SourceHut + Hare + wlroots orbit is real and well-funded by sponsors.
- Hare (https://harelang.com) is the "systems programming for cat-v aesthetes" language. Small contributor pool; high status payoff if you commit consistently.

### IWP9
- The International Workshop on Plan 9. Most recent ones: IWP9 2023 (Waterloo), IWP9 2024 status unclear at time of writing. Check https://iwp9.org and 9fans archives.
- Talks are not blind-reviewed — community-curated. Submit a Plan 9 hack and you're likely accepted.

### ninetimes.org status
WHOIS as of 2026-05-20 shows: **registered on 2026-05-15** via Cloudflare, expiring 2027-05-15. The domain is held (likely by you per the existing plan in your notes, or by someone close — verify with your own registrar). Not available for fresh registration. If this isn't your registration, contact the registrant via Cloudflare's WHOIS privacy relay before someone else builds on the name.

---

## 8. Realistic Income Projections

All numbers are USD, calibrated to mid-2025 / early-2026 market. "Top 10%" means the top decile within that channel, not overall.

| Channel | Time commitment | Realistic median | Top 10% | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub Sponsors (solo) | Part-time | $0-$50/mo | $5k/mo | Median is ~$0. Only flagship project leads clear $5k. |
| Algora bounties | 15-20 hr/week | $500-$2,000/mo | $8k+/mo | Top hunters treat it as a job. Heavy Rust/TS bias. |
| huntr (security) | 10 hr/week | $300-$1,500/mo | $5k+/mo | C/C++ memory bugs are well-suited to Kris's stack. |
| NLnet grant | Lump | €5k-€50k per 6-12 months | €100k | Apply 2-3x/year; expect to win 1 of 4. |
| Sovereign Tech Agency | Lump | €50k-€200k | €1M+ | Need existing project maintainership. |
| Linux Foundation Mentorship | 12 weeks | $6,600 stipend | n/a | One-shot; a recruiting funnel. |
| Igalia / Collabora salary | Full-time | $90k-$160k | $200k+ | Stable, OSS-native, fully remote. |
| Red Hat / SUSE / Canonical | Full-time | $120k-$200k | $300k+ | More political, but more comp. |
| Oxide Computer | Full-time | $201k flat | $201k flat | No negotiation, no equity surprises. |
| Cloudflare / Meta / Google kernel teams | Full-time | $250k-$400k TC | $700k+ TC | Stack-ranked, mostly office or hybrid. |
| Speaking + consulting + sponsorship layered | Part-time hustle | $30k-$80k/year | $150k+/year | Realistic for a known maintainer like Drew DeVault or Daniel Stenberg |

### Layered realistic ceiling for a solo Kris-shaped contributor (1-3 years in)
- One NLnet grant: €25k
- Algora + huntr part-time: $20k/year
- One Sovereign Tech Agency sub-contract on a covered project: €60k
- Conference speaking honoraria + LWN articles: $5k
- GitHub Sponsors / Open Collective: $3k

Combined: $100k-$140k/year, fully OSS-native, from EU and US sources, while remaining independent. This is achievable inside ~24 months if you commit early.

### Layered ceiling 3-5 years in (with established maintainership)
- Permanent Igalia/Collabora seat: $120k-$160k
- Side grant or two: $30k-$50k
- Speaking + writing: $10k

Combined: $160k-$220k while still spending most of your hours on OSS.

---

## 9. Concrete 12-Month Plan

### Phase 1 (months 1-3): Pick a primary
- Choose ONE flagship to contribute to. Recommendation given Kris's profile:
  - **9front** if Plan 9 culture is the priority and you want fast status payoff in a small pond.
  - **Linux DRM / a specific driver subsystem** if you want maximum career optionality and grant access.
  - **FreeBSD src** as a hedge: the BSD culture matches suckless aesthetics, and FreeBSD has more paid pathways than Plan 9.
- Concrete picks for Linux: amdgpu, i915 (Intel gfx, now xe), nouveau (still alive), or a smaller subsystem like UBI/UBIFS, NVMe, or rt-bpf.
- Submit a first patch in week 2. Set up `mutt` or `aerc` for the mailing-list workflow. Add `b4` and `git send-email` to your config.

### Phase 2 (months 3-6): Establish presence
- Get 5-10 patches accepted upstream.
- Start a focused blog. One post every 2-3 weeks, technical, in the LWN-style register (no fluff, deep details).
- Show up on the project's IRC/Matrix/list every day. Lurk first, then answer newcomer questions.
- Apply to LF Mentorship if you're under 30 and the kernel/CNCF route attracts you.

### Phase 3 (months 6-9): First grant application
- Write a 4-page NLnet proposal. Scope: a discrete piece of work in your chosen project. E.g. "Port 9front venti to support modern AMD64 NUMA layouts" or "Implement io_uring backend for [foo]."
- Submit ninetimes.org issue 1. Don't aim for a polished publication — aim for "links to interesting Plan 9 work this month plus one editorial." Quarterly is fine.
- Submit a FOSDEM talk for Jan/Feb (CFP closes Nov).

### Phase 4 (months 9-12): Compound and consolidate
- By month 12 you want:
  - 15-25 upstream patches in
  - An NLnet decision (yes or no, doesn't matter — you've shown you can write a credible proposal)
  - One accepted talk (FOSDEM devroom counts; LPC less likely year 1)
  - 5-10 issues of ninetimes.org
  - First income: $5k-$25k cumulative from bounties, sponsors, or grant.

This puts you in position year 2 to apply for Sovereign Tech Agency, target a permanent maintainer slot, and convert one corporate user into a sponsor retainer.

### Tooling and process to set up immediately
- `git send-email`, `b4`, `lei` (lore.kernel.org email indexing)
- `aerc` or mutt for mailing-list-driven dev (matches suckless aesthetic)
- IRC bouncer (ZNC, soju) for OFTC + Libera persistent presence
- A non-pseudonymous email tied to your domain for upstream interactions; the email you use should be the same one you'll be famous under
- Sign your commits with a long-lived GPG/SSH key tied to your real name
- LinkedIn presence (yes, really) for the corporate sponsor pipeline; you don't have to post, just exist

---

## 10. Things to Avoid

### Solo-OS / solo-kernel hobby projects
- Writing your own operating system is the most expensive form of identity expression. Pedagogically excellent. Economically and status-wise: near-zero return unless you can sustain it for 5+ years and produce something genuinely new (Theo, Russ Cox, Andrew Tanenbaum tier).
- TempleOS, SerenityOS, Redox have very different cost-benefit profiles; SerenityOS has launched careers (Andreas Kling now at Ladybird), but he's a special case.

### Maintainer burnout traps
- Don't take maintainership of a project you don't actually want to maintain for 10 years. The OSS culture punishes "I took it then dropped it" much more than "I never took it."
- Set explicit working hours and explicit out-of-scope tags from day one.
- Read Antirez's "five-year horizon" essay and Daniel Stenberg's "burnout" posts before committing.

### JS / web framework detours
- Per the brief: skip these. The income ceiling there is high but the culture is incompatible with the prestige you actually want. Webpack maintainership pays well; nobody at FOSDEM Plan 9 devroom respects it.

### Vaporware crypto-funded OSS
- Be wary of grants from foundations whose token is the funding source. They go to zero. Examples: many Web3 OSS grants in 2021-2022 evaporated when treasury dollar values collapsed.
- Exceptions: Optimism RetroPGF and Gitcoin have actually paid out millions sustainably. Treat them as bounty income, not a primary stream.
- Generally: take the money, ship the deliverable, don't make it your identity.

### Anti-patterns specific to suckless / Plan 9 culture
- Don't show up and immediately propose rewriting their software in Rust. Almost a meme at this point.
- Don't propose adding Discord/Slack to a community that uses IRC. Use their tools.
- Don't argue about licensing on day 1. Read the room.
- Don't fork-and-trash-talk. The cat-v / 9front community has long memories.

### Time sinks dressed up as work
- Endlessly polishing dotfiles and reading about other people's setups — bounded value, easy to overdo.
- Bikeshedding the editor / IDE / OS / WM choice once you've already picked one.
- Following too many maintainers on social media. Pick five. Read their actual work, not their tweets.

---

## Quick-reference URLs

- Sovereign Tech Agency: https://www.sovereign.tech
- NLnet propose: https://nlnet.nl/propose
- Prossimo: https://www.memorysafety.org
- OpenSSF Alpha-Omega: https://openssf.org/community/alpha-omega
- LFX Mentorship: https://lfx.linuxfoundation.org/tools/mentorship/
- NSF POSE: https://new.nsf.gov/funding/opportunities/pose-pathways-enable-open-source-ecosystems
- FreeBSD Foundation jobs: https://freebsdfoundation.org/our-work/job-openings/
- Igalia jobs: https://www.igalia.com/jobs/
- Collabora jobs: https://www.collabora.com/careers/
- Oxide: https://oxide.computer/careers
- Algora: https://algora.io
- Polar: https://polar.sh
- huntr: https://huntr.com
- LWN pitch contacts: corbet@lwn.net, jake.edge@lwn.net
- Linux kernel newcomer guide: https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/process/howto.html
- LWN "How to participate": https://lwn.net/Articles/HowToParticipate/
- 9front: http://9front.org and https://shithub.us
- suckless: https://suckless.org and https://lists.suckless.org

---

## Bottom line

The most leveraged single move for this profile is: pick one flagship project this quarter, become a recognizable contributor over 12 months, then convert that recognition into either (a) an NLnet/STA grant, (b) an Igalia/Collabora/Oxide seat, or (c) a corporate sponsor retainer. Status in this world is built by sustained presence on mailing lists and at FOSDEM, not by social media. Money follows status with a 12-24 month lag.

The ninetimes.org plan is a strong status play **in parallel** to the contributor work, not instead of it. Editorial standing without technical standing reads as "blogger" in this community; editorial standing with technical standing reads as "Corbet."