: Re: Attracting and retaining volunteers to edit technical doc for open source projects I volunteer as an editor for the Mozilla Developer Network (MDN), an organization that creates free open source

@BetL639

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I write voluntarilly on sites like this. But I also write for money. (My full time job is school teacher.) What motivates me to write in different circumstances varies. For example, when writing teaching resources I don't usually accept a job for less than thirty pounds per hour. However, writing here doesn't pay. I do it because I get satisfaction out of helping people and because writing about topics makes my thinking about them clearer. One thing that helps me appreciate how I am helping other people is the voting system on the site. If people like my answers they vote them up. If they don't like them they vote them down. There is a tangible response to what I contribute.

I just asked my son, who contributed a huge amount of material to a Pokemon site, why he did it. He said, 'Because I thought I was helping people.' He received an award, a copy of a new game, because of his contributions, but he didn't do it for the reward. He did it because he thought he "could contribute something worthwhile".

What I see Mozilla asking for is money or my time to read about new features, etc. I don't see requests for writers. I don't see benefits for writers. I am the sort of person who is prepared to do this sort of job and yet I wasn't aware that there was a need. You need to make this more visible.

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