If you've written or maintain open source software, why do you do it? What's your motivation? And would you be more motivated if you got paid for it?
I wanted to learn how to solve the problem. I wanted to learn a new language. I figured since I was doing it anyway I might as well do it openly.<p>Now I keep doing it because it starts conversations with others and I occasionally see it being used by others which is a big dopamine hit.
The motivation to write it was to do something useful the best quality I knew how.<p>To continue maintaining it, it's mainly a feeling of being stuck doing it the last years. Some of the practical aspects have become a huge burden.<p>Internal and external motivation are quite different.