Top all-time · #4595
Thomas Depierre
Personal blog · softwaremaxims.com/blogprogrammingcareer
Thomas Depierre writes Musings about software, a personal blog at softwaremaxims.com about programming and career. Since 2019, 16 different Hacker News readers have linked it 28 times, most often “I am not a supplier (2022)”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-07-18, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (7) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Thomas Depierre's 'I am not a supplier' post, which argues that open source maintainers are not paid suppliers owed free fixes. It is cited in threads on supply-chain attacks and maintainer disputes, and one comment links a post on developer tooling economics.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 7 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
The Blog of Thomas Depierre, Elixir and DevOps consultant.
Most-linked posts?
- I am not a supplier (2022)7 people · 8 mentions · first linked 2022-12-31
- The Hobbyist Maintainer Economic Gravity Well4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2026-01-11
- You Are All on the Hobbyists Maintainers' Turf Now3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2024-04-02
- FOSS Won and Why It Matters3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-11-16
- Support Maintainers Without SBOM2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2023-02-05
- Reviewing AI Code Is Not a Viable Argument2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2026-07-19
- The Economics of Developer Tooling2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2023-05-25
What Hacker News says?
> Report any problems found. This makes usage robust and supports open source support and development. Project maintainers/developers are not free labor. If you need a proper solution to any problem, make a contract and pay them. This idea that someone will magically solve your problem for free needs to die. https://www.softwaremaxims.com/blog/not-a-supplier
Comment linking /blog/not-a-supplier
on “Polyfill supply chain attack hits 100K+ sites”Submitted I am not a supplier (2022) as a story · 121 points
HN discussionFor people who don't get raccoon in a dumpster reference: https://www.softwaremaxims.com/blog/not-a-supplier
Comment linking /blog/not-a-supplier
on “Xz/liblzma: Bash-stage Obfuscation Explained”Submitted I am not a supplier (2022) as a story · 31 points
HN discussionObligatory article, "I am not a supplier.": < https://www.softwaremaxims.com/blog/not-a-supplier > Folks that disagree with a maintainer's actions are generally free to fork the project and maintain an alternative -- that's one of the primary features of open source software. And if end users prefer that new fork to the original maintainer's version, that'll probably be the one that survives. But maintainers have no…
Comment linking /blog/not-a-supplier
on “KeePassXC Debian maintainer has removed all network features”Submitted FOSS Won and Why It Matters as a story · 5 points
HN discussionLocation: France, Jura Remote: Yes Willing to relocate: No Technologies: Elixir, Postgres, AWS, Erlang, React Résumé/CV: https://www.softwaremaxims.com/resume Email: depierre.thomas@gmail.com
Comment linking /resume
on “Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (April 2019)”Submitted You Are All on the Hobbyists Maintainers' Turf Now as a story · 5 points
HN discussion2024 (kind of) follow-up: https://www.softwaremaxims.com/blog/open-source-hobbyists-tu... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39910558
Comment linking /blog/open-source-hobbyists-turf
on “I am not a supplier (2022)”Submitted FOSS Won and Why It Matters as a story · 3 points
HN discussion> supply chain security https://www.softwaremaxims.com/blog/not-a-supplier "You are not buying from a supplier, you are a raccoon digging through dumpsters for free code."
Comment linking /blog/not-a-supplier
on “Vercel ends open-source sponsorship program giving projects 24hr notice”Submitted Reviewing AI Code Is Not a Viable Argument as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThis is a great read. I think we can learn as much (or more) from the failures as we can from the successes [1]. Developer tooling is also just a very difficult business to be in [2]. [1] https://codecodeship.com/blog/2023-04-19-parker-selbert [2] https://www.softwaremaxims.com/blog/economics-developer-tool...
Comment linking /blog/economics-developer-tools
on “Open Source Business Challenges and Reality, Rui Ueyama (Creator of Mold Linker)”Submitted FOSS Won and Why It Matters as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted You Are All on the Hobbyists Maintainers' Turf Now (2024) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted I am not a supplier (2022) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Can I have some DX too? as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted I Am Not a Supplier as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Reviewing AI Code Is Not a Viable Argument as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Hobbyist Maintainer Economic Gravity Well as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Hobbyist Maintainer Economic Gravity Well as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Hobbyist Maintainer Economic Gravity Well as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Hobbyist Maintainer Economic Gravity Well as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Cloud Is Not Optional as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Economics of Developer Tooling as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted We Need More Process Engineering in Software as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Support Maintainers Without SBOM as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted You can Support Maintainers without SBOM as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
