 Hello everybody, thank you so much for the kind introduction, so I'm not gonna bore you again with another introduction of myself But thank you to the comprehensive introduction. So let's dive in quickly into the session before we start I would like to have a show of hands, please How many folks here have contributed to WordPress show fans, please? Awesome. Awesome How many folks here have not contributed to WordPress before? Okay. Good fair enough How many people here how many of you make a living from WordPress? Good. Good. That's a that's a wide bunch So well, you all need don't need to say tell you that since especially since most of you are WordPress contributors that WordPress is an open-source project and it depends on ongoing sustained contributions for survival, right? so WordPress needs that going and to facilitate that a program called five for the future was created sometime in the past few years and it essentially encourages individuals and organizations to pledge their time towards WordPress Now of course WordPress needs contributions and contributing is a noble act But what if I told you that? Ongoing contributions or sustained contributions is a great way to grow and thrive What if I told you that there's a solid business case for organizations and individuals to continue contributing to WordPress So to demystify all these questions I have with me some of the best I I mean it the best WordPress contributors that I personally know. Please join me in welcoming family proceed Jonathan de Rochers and Tammy Lister We've already heard about all of them. So I'm without further ado. I'm gonna ask them a bunch of questions and together We're gonna learn the answers to both these questions. Like how can we grow by contributing? How can we? Make ongoing sustained contributions to WordPress and how can we you know? How can organizations contribute to WordPress and you know sustain and grow with WordPress all right? So Femi Jonathan and Tammy. I'm super excited to have you with with us today. So I Know that we've you you've been introduced But could you please please please briefly share about your contributor joining WordPress so far? How did you start contributing? How has it journey gone? What where has it gelled at you and where are you right now? So let's go in after me gonna we'll start with Femi. We'll go to Jonathan and then we go to Tammy Hi, everybody. I'm Femi proceed from San Jose, California. I am the block editor and user docs rep I am also a WordPress content writer. I Start I've been working on the web since 2007 I started as a front-end developer and then Once I discovered WordPress. I started to build custom websites with WordPress for small agencies and By the end of 2020 I was kind of worn out by development and I wanted to try something different I wasn't sure what that something else was but all I knew was I wanted to stay in the WordPress space So I started to look for ways to get more involved in the WordPress community. I Started to show up in the slack channels for some of the teams specifically docs team and You know shadow in for the team meetings and get an understanding of what's what the team does and how they do things and I have to say it was quite intimidating and Confusing at first, but after a while, you know, I started to take on writing the meeting notes for the docs team and Around this time Milana put in a blog post calling for volunteers to help out with the 5.8 release so I started to take on tasks for 5.8 specifically for the end user documentation and That's when I figured I really loved writing technical content and since then I've been actively Contributing to the docs team. I have been one of the docs co-leads for several of the release cycles and also one of the noteworthy contributors for several release cycles since 5.8 and Now I'm also taking up the role as the blog editor and use a doc strip and I'm here now Hi everyone, I'm Jonathan Dorgers. I live in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and I first discovered WordPress I think around 2007 I was in college and a friend of mine said hey, you know, check this out. It's pretty sweet Let's you can do a lot with it and then throughout college I would use it for projects and for Some side work for some freelance work along the way When I graduated I moved into the small agency space and started building more sites with WordPress and taking it You know, I went to school for web and internet so it was it was kind of the path I was going on and Quickly became my favorite tools. I started going to some work camps in I think 2012 was work at Rhode Island and work Camp New York City were my first ones and I went to the contributor days there and Got some insight into You know like the Wizard of Oz big peeking behind the curtain and seeing how the sausage was built and how There was this huge community of people that Were just like me just like all of you here today that could Put effort into improving the software fixing bugs growing the community around it And I actually just passed my 10-year anniversary of my first credited Contribution to the project, which is really great I moved on into academia and I worked at a university where All of our web presence was on WordPress and in 2018 I moved on to Bluehost where I was hired as a full-time contributor for Their commitment to the fight for the future program, which will I think we'll dive into in quite quite a lot of detail here Today, I'm the maintainer of several different components in core. I'm a core committer And I'm frequently Not unreleased squads, but I'm there behind the scenes making sure that everyone has the resources They need to succeed and to make sure that the gears keep turning the lights stay on and Doing a lot of the un visit the invisible work behind the scenes that We can't really expect unsponsored folks to be excited about or Actually spend their time on because a lot of unsponsored folks have less time to contribute in general And they want to spend that on the things that they're more passionate about and so I kind of pride myself in that I'm employed to do that. So that's some of the stuff that I do on a day-to-day basis Hi, I'm Tammy. I think I've probably had most Versions of contributing from I initially started where someone said I don't think you should be doing your own thing You should try this thing called WordPress. I try this thing called WordPress and haven't looked back And then I just started contributing Doing my own thing sponsoring myself Didn't know that's what it was called then And then slowly started doing most teams I've done something with over the time and then I kind of evolved to be doing full-time Contribution and I've worked on numerous projects raising from co-editor work Through to doing thing work as well and lots of different teams I now find myself in a really interesting position where I'm at inside part of their fight for the future working specifically on developer work for me, it's been a really interesting different perspective on different types of Contribution and different teams. I've worked from core to design through to Buddy press through to things and for me I really enjoy that kind of variety that we have within a contribution project as well. I Love it. So I was not kidding when I said I have the best panelists Really, they are and I love seeing the diversity that we have and the amount of work that they've done and the teams that they've Contributed to all right, so let's dive deep in. I'm curious So I'm gonna start with family here again So how has contributing to WordPress helped you grow and How has the journey been and of course you've mentioned that a bit, but what what skills have you learned and How does it help you on a daily basis? Yeah for So first and foremost for me, it helped me make a pivot in my career from web development to content writing and I think The skills the learning the skills that you learn here the learning experience you get working in the docs team It's very different from the experience you get working as a solo developer you know in a small agency independently and You know, I've learned to collaborate with the bigger team. I've learned to you know Which is spread across the globe You know working for a bit different time zones working, you know only like communicating in slack and You know, I've learned to write better I've learned to write with more clarity and You know learn to be more transparent with the work I do and also Just it's very different it's it's a very open environment so And these are all skills is that you don't get when you're working as and you know as a solo developer independently, right? so and also the cherry on top is I get to build a reputation for my work and also You know connect with the bigger WordPress community and I think even the fact that I was able to I Was invited to speak at this panel. It's just a testament to what contributing has helped me achieve in the long term and Yeah You folks want to add to it? Yeah, I think all of those things extend to even sponsored people, you know personal growth Growth amongst your colleagues from things that you learn are able to pass along Yeah cultural growth being exposed to new cultures I've been very fortunate to be able to travel to all over the world to do this job and to Help contributors around the around the globe Yeah, it's it opens up many doors in many different ways Plus one and so many I also think Teaches you a lot of human skills It also the ability to not get bored In the best possible way for me. I've gone from design web development design About the development Bit of product and that has really given me longevity and it continues and it will give me longevity I think in some career spaces, you know, we're all aging whether we like it or not Because some clear spaces you maybe need to think about pivoting and changing and moving out of those companies and within this space and Within contributing you can do that And I've also seen people contributing to change careers as well that it's been something that I've actually seen people able to do as well Interesting so the things that I'm hearing is personal growth Networking and even like changing careers like gaining skills. So what I'm hearing is there's definitely a Real benefit to contributing it could be a way to you know augment what you learn the skills You learn and to sort of like amplify them excellent Moving on again, I'd like to start with Femi again as so Femi you're a self-sponsored contributor And I know we have a diverse panel. We have Jonathan and Tammy who are sponsored and family yourself sponsored you work on your own, right? So The challenge that I've heard from many contributors is that they struggled to contribute consistently I mean some some folks may make one-off contributions. They drop off So in your case, I mean you mentioned that you've been a noteworthy contributor since 5.8, right? So, how do you contribute consistently? And what tips do you have for our volunteered or self-sponsored contributors who would like to sponsor consistently or to contribute consistently? Yeah, the one thing that keeps me motivated to contribute is I'm constantly learning new things You know, whether it's simple as writing the meeting minutes to get her markup language to setting up projects and workflows there's always something you learn and that's exciting and The WordPress community is a bunch of really smart people and I feel it's a great way to surround yourself with smart people especially if you are a freelancer and you're working from home you're by yourself and Interacting with the team it kind of make energizes me and it just I just love it and also it's kind of thrilling to know you are you know Working on the documentation of a software which powers like 43 points some percentage of the web So that that kind of is thrilling for me as far as tips go I've one thing I've noticed is folks get really excited when they come into the team to contribute and They take on a lot of tasks and then they get frustrated when they don't make progress and then they just just leave so My number one tip is start small You know take on small simpler tasks. Maybe one or two tasks and You know have small wins and then you can just build on it and the same goes for the number of team teams that you participate in non-slag You know first start off with one or two slack channels and you know Go from there because slack can get really overwhelming sometimes Just just just build on it and pick your own adventures like some days you might just Make small changes to your to some tasks and some days some days you could just rewrite an entire article and either is fine You know don't beat yourself up. You know just but also don't overcome it. Just be realistic with what you You know what you set out to do and make sure you don't get burnt out or You know frustrated Tell me and Jonathan. I'm curious your your folks are I mean especially in your case, Tammy I know you've you've gone through a bunch of roles. You've been sponsored self sponsored Jonathan similar as your story as well So, how do you contribute consistently and do you have any tips for folks? Especially from from like in the perspective of folks who sort of like traverse through all those All those ways Yeah, I you if you're not sure how to be Take a step back and observe but You want to always try to be realistic with what you can deliver it's a lot better to Deliver less or promise less than it is to promise a lot and then not be able to do what you say you're going to do or And sometimes that's not to say you shouldn't aim high at something that's out of your comfort zone or that you've never done before But you don't want to sign up for 40 hours of work when realistically you have five hours a week and or something of that nature and so You know, don't be afraid to start small like Femi said and Work on increasing or becoming more comfortable and maybe after a couple of weeks of reading this Handbook of how to contribute to this team You could get a lot more done in that same amount of time as you would have if you just overwhelmed yourself at the beginning on the onset I Think sometimes people think it's all or nothing with contribution. So My sponsorship is eight hours and for me, that's perfect It gives me that perspective still of the work that I do which I can then bring and it also means I can Keep those skills going, but I can also do that core work. It also means for many companies when they are able to balance Distribution and I think that is also really important Either no matter where you whether you are self-sponsoring or whether you are a company who are looking to sponsor people sometimes it's very hard to do full-time sponsorship just from that person the maintenance of that person the isolation of that person the Just the commitment of that as well So I think it's really healthy when I have been full-time that's been great when I've been on teams It's been amazing When I've been working on some projects, but I would say particularly for me in this in my own situation. I'm Really worthwhile with the perspectives that I get to go outside and learn and then come back in by having that and that balance And I personally want more part-time Contributors because I think that that perspective makes us have a very healthy project We always always will need people as you kind of point out the full-time contributors are keeping the lights on They're picking up the trash on the floor and keeping the lights on but we're also going to need those outside Perspectives of the people that are building the people that are working in agencies the people that are doing that who can feed from their colleagues who can then go into these projects with Limited time, but they can take that perspective from working on those projects and then go and do some contribution So personally, I really value that perspective So what I'm hearing is there's value in pacing yourself. There's value in Making contributions a habit this value in again looking at different perspectives This it's even okay to maybe pick up pick bosses and you know like take it easy Yeah, I those are interesting perspectives and I think there's a lot to it that we need to you know, like explore more So we've spoken about contributions Individually, that's I think it's time to you know go a bit into you know Organizations because like if you look at the fire for the future program It's it's a space where companies or organizations they can actually you know sort of like pledge their time To contribute to WordPress, right? So I want to ask this to Jonathan and Tammy since you are sponsored So I'm curious. So how do contributions work in your organizations? So I'd like Tammy's perspective. I mean, I know you work for inside and Jonathan I know you work for Bluehost so both are entirely different companies yours isn't hosting Jonathan Yours is a hosting company. Tammy yours is an agency So and in your case, Tammy, I know you've worked you've run a bunch of work in different organizations So I'm curious like how do your organizations do sponsored contributions. So the bus the To share more on where I'm coming from. I like our audience I mean at least the entrepreneurs or the business owners and our organizations To get a bit more insight on how they can structure their own sponsored contributions if they wish to Yeah, I think sponsored contributions are really important and we want we need a balance of self-sponsored and hobbyists and business sponsored As far as how it works inside of Bluehost, I'm on a team of We're called the WordPress Center of Excellence So it's basically a team of people that are the respected experts in in WordPress development Within Bluehost and then we're relied on to give guidance on best practices and all of those types of things I'm a hundred percent external facing and my colleagues are a mix and We we really outside of the business interest that they work on directly I have a huge amount of autonomy as far as what I work on and I'm really not I've never been told what to do as far as like what to contribute to or how to contribute it's more of I'm trusted to have the awareness of where I'm needed the most and where I can have the best impact And as long as we're out there having a positive impact on the community It doesn't really matter what form that takes it could be speaking it could be leading a meet-up It could be committing to core and in some cases and so And I'm very fortunate to have that and it's It's really important. I think for companies to give back by sponsoring folks because You know, we want to prevent the tragedy of the commons where everybody's taking with WordPress is a free software and you can use it and use it all you want and modify it all you want and build on it All you want and if you have a business that you're You're taking in tens or hundreds or millions of dollars You know, it's in your best interest for that software to grow and become better And the things that you're building on top of that software will directly benefit and improve from Sponsored contributions that you're you're able to give back and I think that's really important So for me, it's pretty much been since June It's it's kind of early as I mentioned I have a hour So one of the tips I would give if you have that time is to try and literally pick a chunk So I try and have a half of a day for me I Have actually been involved in two releases, which is six point three and six point four so it's been pretty much and Like he was saying the trust to do which I think is incredible And to be able to be given that But also I'm here because of that I'm at the committee summit because of that sponsorship, which I think is something we have to also recognize that that also Enables people to be able to attend these things by my accent. I'm obviously not from this country and I had to travel a little bit and So therefore it enables people to come to these events it enables people to join these conversations And I think that is really important as far as day-to-day for me It's pretty obvious the air is for me to contribute in and and the air is to join in I think it's an important note that For sponsored contributors to constantly being releases would be something I would warn against for me It actually six point four is a kind of unique release. So it's kind of important, but I think Sponsors contributors Making sure that documentation happens making sure that systems kind of happen and making sure that Issues happen. One other thing is also not Promoting tickets within because you don't have that bias but also Ensuring that colleagues know where to report things or surfacing the right information. So say a version of WordPress comes out saying just the crib notes or sharing that information We often make these presumptions because someone works on WordPress. They must know everything about WordPress Well, that's not fair to make that expectation. But if we are living in that space and we are Kind of with those things we're going to have access that information a bit more John, thank you. I think you both touched upon this a bit. So I want to I want to prop brought that a little more. So Is that a business case for organizations to contribute WordPress? So I'm asking this question in a very mindful way because I know we are in a global financial Everything meltdown like there's a downturn happening. Definitely. That's a down on happening folks are not hiring as much as they used to So in that case, like people are being really companies are being really mindful about, you know, either hiring new people or like contracting new folks or Even like getting their own employees to work on open source projects like WordPress. So in this milieu, what do you think? For contributing to work I know you both touched upon it. I would Was on this part of the question. So which is why I'm asking this again Yeah, I think it goes back to the business cases that you know, you're building you wouldn't want To build an office in a building that's going to disappear, right? If the Foundation of the building disappears, then you don't have an office anymore And so it's really about fostering that software and making sure that it's growing and improving and constantly evolving to new things that are out in the ecosystem or new technologies And so like for example at Bluehost, we've we've built a new onboarding experience And it uses a lot of the underlying Gutenberg packages that are published into WordPress to give a more native feeling to it and so By contributing back to the project we improve the accessibility of those packages. We improve the you know The experience the the the native feeling that you're in WordPress Consistency and so by improving those things you automatically in a way Improve your own products that you're going to build on this Maybe you have a plug-in that has forms or whatever it is You know, and it's just how can you focus on the greater good of the project and that's something that's also great, too Is that by being sponsored? It's important that you're unbiased and it's okay for you to come to the table and say Hey like this bug is really affecting us and we should look into it because it's obviously not us but not Come and say hey, we want this right so you have to look at both sides You have to look out for things that it might not be the greater good for the way that you want it But finding that compromise And by being sponsored. It's by no means a pay-to-play like I'm you're not automatically going to get people that Decision level Trust but over time they'll build that through their their goodwill contributions and showing that they are able to be Agnostic to an organization and think about the software as a whole and the health of everyone involved I think two words come to mind one is advocacy and you have to sort of particularly Agency perspective if someone came to me and said hey this thing doesn't work Within inside I would then have to be okay Is this bug only relevant to this particular project that was in a very particular situation or is this affecting all agencies in Wordpress generally it is affecting or everybody within Wordpress if it affects one person who's doing something And generally for me, it's going to do with the co-editor work That's a reason to get it fixed and those kind of decisions are Really great to be able to know and be able to speak for that space and be able to speak for that work The other is efficiency, which I think is a really good business case You know efficiency of knowledge you have the ability to surface knowledge more effectively but you also have the ability to know things like roadmaps efficiency to be able to just Help with the code the code base is just such a big thing as well Know when you can build It's always it's one of the kind of ones at the moment. When should you build a custom block? When should you build a pattern? just as things are changing so rapidly and Things are happening that kind of advice that you get and then listening within the organization and Kind of been able to be the middle point a little bit or trying to help a little bit there You will find that I think one of the business cases I would say in the current climate that is harder to say is the full time. I will be honest with that but I think that you can find a balance with What depending on the company depending on what the company wants to do and how big the company is because we're talking about a company But Yeah, there is always a reason for some form Makes sense. Thank you So I think the if I were to summarize this I would as you very likely pointed out to me Advocacy and efficiency and as you pointed out Jonathan We need somebody to keep the lights on and we don't want the you know the floor beneath us to sink and there's of course like You you make an impact on the ecosystem that you work on and that definitely It's valuable now. We've spoken to sponsored contributors for me I'd like a self-sponsored or a volunteer or individual contributor perspective for you from you on this topic I want to I remember you mentioned this specifically like you mentioned about how your contributions really complement your work, right? So could you elaborate on that just a little bit? I would like to know more about you know How your contributions support you in your professional journey as a freelancer in other words What is the business case for you as a freelancer to contribute to WordPress? Yeah for starters it helped me make a pivot in my career from web development to Technical writing and I think contributing is a great way to test out the waters if you Want to make a career if you want to explore a new career path or if you want to Make some changes in your career whole new skills in the current job Without the pressures of a deadline or a fast-paced schedule, right? and I Got some real-world experience Writing technical content and you know and all my contributions are public So they're all linked to my wordpress profile, which means someone wants to hire me based on my contributions It's all out there and You know Yeah, I Guess yeah, that's it. I guess also the fact that you're here, which time we mentioned which is also a direct result of your contributions, so I like it so We've we've been exploring the part of how contributions help in Femi's case freelancers or in Jonathan's and Tami's case organizations, so I'd like to sum up what we discussed so far and because I Work full-time on fire for the future and the question that I keep hearing from organizations How do we set it up because that's that's always very ambiguous and I know we we discussed that a little bit So let's say I mean this to the all the entrepreneurs here in this audience and watching his live or watching us later in What was our TV if between the three of you you could share any advice to organization specifically on How they can set up their program and how they can scale it up in any tips is fine Any anything that comes to your mind from your vast experience contributing to WordPress? Let's keep it short though. Yeah Oh, sorry. I think that a great way to start is to just take your team to a word camp and a contributor day. I Mean that in a sense crowd sources, they're onboarding into Contributing and then you don't have to start with set amounts of time But maybe you do something where like some agencies do the whole company once a month They have the whole day is contributing to whatever you would like in the project or adjacent to the project And so maybe that's a way to test that and maybe some people stand out and they're excelling at that and you could say hey Well, how would you like? You know a week a month or something of that effect You it will be really difficult to really just cold turkey make that change sometimes Because you'll have lead times with clients and you might have to do a little bit of planning In most cases so that that's kind of it just again start small just as you would as single contributor and you don't have to commit your whole organization for a whole week every every month Yeah, I would say Don't think you have to be so fixated on a certain amount of hours that you do based on What you were saying Think of it as a goal And I love that idea of think picking one day and have like a contribution even once a month once a year It doesn't matter you you're trying and I think that that's the ideal You're getting that information and you're starting. I would also flip it to Self-sponsored if you really really are looking for that and you're really looking to start just Start showing your contributions because I have quite a few people come to me and they say hey I would really love to be sponsored for this. I really love to do this. Take it slowly If you Running yourself you just gonna burn out So just really think of that and they think of the longevity both of both sides of longevity of the contributor and the longevity of the sponsor Are incredibly important for our ecosystem if we don't have both we pretty much don't have open source That's what these programs like five for the future about it's about longevity of both sides And it's not about an arbitrary number. So that's to me. That's what it's about. So It's really about care and consideration and building and nurturing When you don't have the backing of a company coming for events and wordcams like this It gets hard financially for self-sponsored contributors. So, you know one thing that companies could do is you know have you know help out like start a financial aid for sponsoring the self-sponsored contributors because Yeah, and the other thing wordpress releases happen like every three four months and There are a lot of self-sponsored contributors who work and who are involved in the process. So if Companies can sponsor contributors per release, right, you know, that's that's something that would be awesome Thank you folks and for me. I'm glad you mentioned sponsorship because that was the main topic that I wanted to touch upon today and I Purposefully, you know kept it towards the end Sponsorship, I mean, it's something that I have been hearing it's something that I'm trying to support a bunch of people with So that there's a lot of contributors in the wordpress project who do a lot to address Unfortunately, they are limited to the number of contributions or the amount of contributions that they can make Because like they are volunteers they are unable to you know contribute us beyond a certain number of time But many of them are quite passionate They really really want to do it and I know from speaking to a bunch of people that they really want to do it Like and they have the skills to it if if if and like fully they could you know Give that extra time to contribute wordpress. It would really really help the project So my question and with this we are going to wrap up this discussion and maybe you know open to some questions is on It's all three of you on I want to start with the sponsored contributors first So to all the folks and the reason why I'm starting with you first is because you are sponsored So to to all the folks here to all the contributors out here who are looking for sponsorship What advice do you have? How can they you know get sponsorship? How can they get sponsored for their work? Yeah, for me it was really just being present at events as many as I could I was fortunate enough where my employers were in the wordpress space and so You know going to events and meeting people and meeting other contributors In many cases the contributors We we deal with a lot of really really difficult problems and it attracts some of the smartest people I've ever met to Explore these and find solutions and so just meeting them and talking to them and learning from what they are working on Was just a huge way for personally to just almost level up myself and Learn learn different things The other thing is kind of just coming back to what we were saying at the beginning is just be realistic and be reliable be be present be persistent Ask questions and just let your work speak for itself. Do just do good work. Do it for the right reasons and Do it in public as you should an open source and Eventually, there'll be a timeline or a track record or your wordpress.org profile be All sparkly and loaded with badges and contributions and all that And then when it comes time where you see something an organization that aligns with your goals And that is looking to sponsor someone you can They'll likely already be aware of you or they'll know what your work and what you've worked on so The only thing I'd say is I think there's a little bit of a danger to look and say there's one path to sponsorship Because I really do not think there is the path that I had to sponsorship. It's very meandering and very Was initially the very first time I ended up in sponsorship was not intended I didn't take my first job to have sponsorship that ended up in sponsorship That was many many years ago To give advice based on my experience would not be the best because it would be based on purely on my experience So I will abstract that and give Point one work out how much time you have do you want a job that involves part of that to be sponsored? Do you want a job that involves full-time? Sponsorship that will change that would mean that you would stop doing the your current job That would mean you would want to go and work in certain companies if you would want to do that So that changes the conversation that you need to start having with yourself There are a number of ways that you can start looking for a self-sponsored if you want to do a Number of ways that you can put little badges and different things on to start having that for yourself tips or whatever Start considering that that does not pay a hundred percent But that starts you getting a little bit more visible and saying hey, I'm in this space Hey, hey, I would like to be seen as you were saying like start kind of getting that start You do not need to run straight into a release to get sponsorship That would be my big thing because sometimes people think they need to do that in order to do that And then they take on a big release commit to 40 hours a week when they are trying to run their own business and that is not good for someone So really just find out what you want to do and work out what time you have And and then kind of go from there because it's really going to be different Do you want to be sponsored for the current thing you're doing or do you want to change as well? So that's part of it I guess before passing it to Femi With self-sponsored contribution like we're talking about businesses sponsoring people and obviously the financial aspect of it But for self-sponsoring it doesn't have to be a financial consideration in some ways It could be a hobby that you do for Watching TV a couple nights a week that you you kind of tinker and so I'm curious if you have like how you think about it Or if that's something that you would recommend to get started as well yeah, I Personally believe if you have the time to binge and scroll you have the time to do anything so you just have to make it a priority and You just have to show up and do the work. That's my mantra if I want to do something So I think you have time you just you know, we have to find something that you are really excited about and something that you're really passionate about and just Keep showing up and do the work and don't be afraid to ask questions. Don't be afraid to take on challenges when you are Contributing and also don't let the language barrier be You know, it's top you from Contributing because we're all very Friendly group. So, you know, just just be helpful be kind and Also be realistic about what you set out to do because you don't want to end up burned out of restraint So just learn to balance that So one of the things is before I ever had a job from WordPress my Sponsorship and my my payback from the WordPress was just in the learning was in the knowledge And I think sometimes you need to make that kind of conversation is with with yourself as well I think sometimes these conversations about sponsorship Also need to be looking at the kind of ebb and flow a little bit I it's super tricky because you are giving up some time somewhere and There are bills to pay and But you really need to look at that if you are gaining these skills that mean you can Charge more for something here then great. That's worth doing and and that actually happened to me I was gaining skills which meant I could I even wrote a book and I even could charge more when I was working for myself That that was worth doing. So it's kind of those conversations of happy and that was a self-sponsoring thing as well So making those kind of conversations with yourself about What is this doing? What are you gaining and doing that kind of sheet with yourself? It's really important as well Yeah, I think we are slightly over time, but that's all that we want to talk about So the takeaway that I've I've heard us listening to you all is there's definitely a business case for organizations to you know Contribute to WordPress and even for self-funded contributors if you start contributing There's a bunch you can learn and that's a it's a journey of personal growth it's a journey of passion especially if you're up for it and There's a solid way that you can actually grow as a person or as an individual us as a business So well to wrap up, I guess I would encourage everybody here to you know consider contributing to WordPress more consistently There's so many ways that you can do it And I hope our panelists have shared some tips which help Individuals or organizations to be more consistent in their contributions. Yes, I won't repeat about the five for the future program It's available at wordpress.org slash five It's a way to pledge your time and resources Either individually or as an organization and the number five percent as as we mentioned here. It's just arbitrary It's up to five percent. It's depending on it's what you can contribute again Also, you don't even need to pledge if you contribute consistently That's that's great because the project eventually needs contributions for WordPress to survive and for us to Survive allow or to grow or to thrive along with WordPress WordPress needs these contributions Organizers, can we get maybe like one or two questions? Do we have time for that or should we wrap up? I know we are like slightly over time. So It's a space. Is the time for a question or two maybe anyone? Okay. All right So we have I guess we have time for maybe two questions one to two questions Does anybody in the audience have any questions for these amazing contributors? Any questions? So we have we have we have mics over here Yeah, hi Yeah, okay I just what I was missing and might empower other people to like see the bigger picture Can you point out maybe how much networking helps with finding like getting seen and and being visible and like maybe being sponsored? Yeah, for me it was big because as I said I was going to events. I was meeting the people doing the things I wanted to take part in Getting them to put a name with an avatar or face with an avatar But it's not always the case. Sometimes it's your work. That is Is the networking and people using what you build or contribute to? So I don't I think it's always a interpersonal Networking it's sometimes it's from your work At the beginning not at all for me I spent quite a number of years before I even went to a camp, but that was physical networking And I think it's really important to say that are sometimes our networking is Turning up in this IRC channel back in the day Or coming on a ticket or Making those into those interactions were incredibly powerful. So when I did turn up to my first word camp I was scared I knew and I Could have conversations Did it take me a long time? Yeah, took me a number of years before I still felt comfortable Now working is not my natural thing even now But Having conversations just worked. I do not think though that you need to be a network person In here, but because are in a traditional sense. I think our networking can absolutely happen virtually And I'm probably one of the big testaments to that Because I probably wouldn't be as successful if networking wasn't virtual and to start off with then You can be able to speak and get welcoming Which I think is really really important that we make it accessible for all different types so that we can embrace I agree, you know networking when you're contributing it's kind of like networking online Because you're showing up in the meetings, you know, your name is there in places And when you come in for the conferences people know you from that and they just need to know okay This is the person. This is the avatar. They just have to match that. So it's like an online version of networking I know I said we have time for two questions, but I think we should wrap up because this is five more minutes Until the next session. So thank you everybody for listening patiently and you can find the panelists. They are here You can ask them questions. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it Have an amazing day and thank you the organizers of what can be us. This is a fantastic event We cannot thank you enough and thank you for inviting us to talk about contributions. Thank you. Thank you so much