What If Git’s Maintainers Formed a Cooperative?

Rethinking how open source projects like Git could fund sustainability

Introduction

Git powers almost every software project today. It emerged from necessity. Linus Torvalds crafted it in weeks after the Linux project lost access to BitKeeper. Now, Git is everywhere, from open source to enterprise. Yet it operates without a sustainable funding model. Maintainers carry a silent burden: security patches, bug fixes, and feature requests, all mostly unpaid. What would happen if Git’s maintainers organized into a cooperative to change that?

A Short History of Git

• 2005: Git was born when the Linux project needed an alternative to BitKeeper. Linus built it swiftly with reliability and performance in mind.

• 2008–2010: GitHub launched. Its pull requests, issues, and collaboration features made Git even more accessible.

• Today: Git is universal. Subversion, CVS, and Mercurial are nearly obsolete. Millions of developers work through Git platforms daily.

The Open-Source Funding Problem

Open source was built on reciprocity: beneficiaries give back. That social contract has eroded:

• GitHub, GitLab, Atlassian, Amazon, and Microsoft profit handsomely from Git, yet Git receives minimal direct support.

• Maintainers face burnout, as expectations remain high even without funding.

Recent cases highlight the issue:

• MediatR and AutoMapper: These widely used .NET libraries shifted toward a commercial licensing model, free for individuals and nonprofits, paid for enterprise use to sustain maintainership.

• WiX Toolset: Rob Mensching introduced the Open-Source Maintenance Fee (OSMF), a small fee for commercial users. It’s designed to inject sustainability into a mature open-source project.

Real, World Pilot: WiX Toolset’s OSMF

• Feb 26, 2025: Mensching formally announced the OSMF to address long-standing sustainability challenges, including concerns from the XZ Utils incident about maintainer vulnerabilities.

• April 2025: WiX Toolset v6.0 became the first project to implement OSMF. It required a maintenance fee for official binary releases and certain interaction features, while the source remained freely licensed.

• May 2025: Mensching reported a positive reception. Companies, including Microsoft, paid the fee. Feedback so far suggests education worked better than enforcement, though procurement processes remain a hurdle.

A Cooperative Strategy for Git

If Git’s maintainers launched a cooperative, it could look like this:

1. Membership & Shares

• Contributors (past and present) receive baseline shareholder status.

• Ongoing contributions earn patronage shares, aligned with code, documentation, reviews, and release work.

2. Funding

• Corporate members (Microsoft, GitHub, GitLab, Atlassian, Amazon, etc.) pay scaled annual fees.

• Optional support contracts offer SLAs, bug fixes, or feature work.

3. Governance

• Maintainers direct technical strategy.

• Members vote on resource allocation, fairness adjustments, and budget priorities.

4. Revenue Distribution

• Fees are distributed based on patronage shares.

• Release engineering and security maintenance get guaranteed funding.

Git remains free under GPL; there’s no lock-in. But the responsibility shifts: those who profit from Git fund its sustainability.

Why This Could Work

• Scarcity of expertise: Should maintainers shift support to the cooperative fork, enterprises must follow to stay secure.

• High dependency: Git is too critical to risk running unmaintained.

• Precedent exists: MariaDB forked from MySQL as Oracle took over. The ecosystem followed the maintainers.

The Broader OPEN-SOURCE Crisis

Open source, in many cases, pushes maintainers into untenable positions.

• MediatR and AutoMapper moved to paid licensing.

• Rob Mensching has begun a real-world experiment with OSMF, gaining early participation from major users.

• Git sits at the center of this debate: how do we sustain infrastructure that underpins our industry without compensation?

Closing

Git has transformed how software gets built. But the open-source economy has not kept pace. A cooperative model could reward maintainers fairly, while keeping the software open and thriving.

The real question isn’t whether Git could become a cooperative—it’s whether open source can continue without evolving its funding models.

Call to Action

Does this cooperative approach have merit? Should foundational projects like Git pursue models that ensure companies contribute back to the tools they rely on? I’d like to hear your thoughts.