I am surprised to see this show up again. The idea was ahead of its time, and sank without a trace. Since then, (and during) multiple orgs have attempted to also put some sort of floor below various maintainers. I see these finally beginning to succeed in some places, although I still struggle on a combination of patreon donations and the occasional grant, for what I do. Simon is semi-retired now but I think dnsmasq is mostly out of trouble. I can think of many others still struggling in obscurity.<p>Eric himself, had a bout with stomach cancer, and has mostly withdrawn from the web, tired of the perpetual onslaught and criticism. He´s been working on a new book, for a very long time. IMHO he was the right person at the right time, to get open source into the mainstream, and although many might disagree with him, and his politics, I think his contribution to internet history is assured.<p>ESR´s most recent project was ntpsec.org, which vastly reduced the attack surface of ntp. Another key one used in many places, and needed less now, was
reposurgeon: <a href="http://www.catb.org/esr/reposurgeon/repository-editing.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.catb.org/esr/reposurgeon/repository-editing.html</a>