Technically, #FOSS is _just_ a license, but it's also a culture (with some baggage).
#UXDesign is just a set of techniques that doesn't care if you're open or closed.
It's exhausting how many #FOSS advocates lecture me on how incompatible UX is to open development or that the culture is a delicate flower and I'm doing it wrong.
Things like user studies, user testing, journey maps, or design explorations are indifferent to your culture. They are powerful tools you can embrace or hide from.
@mcr314 "Participatory Design" has been around for decades and I agree it's very powerful. IMHO, this "scratch your own itch" tenant has been pushed too far, often resulting in devs with little UX experience just doing what they want.
But my point shouldn't be to whine (sorry about that) I'm just excited so many projects ARE embracing UX work and we need to speak about HOW they are doing it and why it so important to have a little less "Bazaar" and a tiny bit more "Cathedral"
@scottjenson I don't know what open source projects you have been involved in, or how they have been funded. The whole point of open source is to allow the consumers of the system to update and modify it.
In fact, people who are solving a problem that they have, are in fact, "doing what THEY want". After all, they are the customer.
If you have some other constituency that matters, other than the user of the system, and the UX designers aren't listening to them, then who exactly are you listening to?
Otherwise, you are describing projects (web projects?) that just happen to (re-)use open source components. Do UX designers get involved in APIs for core Rust components?
Scott Jenson
Michael Richardson