Fueling innovative software
July 15-18, 2019
Portland, OR

Working for open source: How to chart your own course

Danese Cooper (NearForm)
11:50am12:30pm Wednesday, July 17, 2019
Open Source
Location: E145/146
Secondary topics:  Open Source
Average rating: ***..
(3.90, 10 ratings)

Who is this presentation for?

  • Anyone who's part of the open source movement

Level

Intermediate

Description

Danese Cooper has worked primarily for open source for 20 of her 30 years in the tech industry, regardless of who her actual employer was.

Danese explains how to chart a career in open source that allows you to work for the future of the movement we all love. Learn how to choose employers, how to decide what to work on, what milestones to set for yourself, and how to know when to move on. Talk about the risks and rewards of change agency and how to avoid burnout. Mostly, though, talk about the rewards of a career that’s not only a job but also an adventure.

What you'll learn

  • Learn how to choose employers, how to decide what to work on, what milestones to set for yourself, how to know when to move on, and how to avoid burnout
  • Understand the risks and rewards of change agency
Photo of Danese Cooper

Danese Cooper

NearForm

Danese Cooper is vice president of special initiatives at NearForm, an Irish tech firm. Previously, she was head of open source software at PayPal, CTO of the Wikimedia Foundation, chief open source evangelist for Sun, and senior director of open source strategies for Intel. Danese was also the inaugural chairperson of the Node.js Foundation. She concentrates on creating healthy open source communities and has served on the boards of Drupal Association, the Open Source Initiative, the Open Source Hardware Association, and she’s advised Mozilla and the Apache Software Foundation. Danese also runs a successful open source consultancy that counts the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the SETI Institute, Harris, and Numenta as clients. She’s been known to knit through meetings.