HackerReposA FIELD GUIDE TO OPEN SOURCE
ProSponsor the shelf♧ 0
← Back to top all-time
EthicalSource
contributor_covenant
HTML2015–2021
EthicalSource / contributor_covenant

contributor_covenant

Pledge your respect and appreciation for contributors of all kinds to your open source project.

Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
7Distinct people
13Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
2.3KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

Pledge your respect and appreciation for contributors of all kinds to your open source project.

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use has been verified yet.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

  • opal/opal · linked in 4 of the same discussions

Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 5:04:57 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year13 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2015-06-19 06:32:49 UTC to 2021-04-07 08:02:59 UTC.

02462015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 7 mentions; 1 submissions, 6 comments20152016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 1 submissions, 0 comments20182019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2021

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC716
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC110
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101

What Hacker News says

13 sources
smoothdeveloper·Apr 7, 2021
For people who understand french (or can use translation tool) this is the only account back in 2019 of the events: https://www.lemonde.fr/pixels/article/2019/09/17/richard-sta... It scores much higher to me on journalism than whatever came in US press. It seems people in US don't value defending free speech, and tend to get offended easily due to taking things only on first degree. In that frame, they should care more about defending the first amendment of their constitution, and try to get other degree when interpreting words they have negative reaction to. I don't know how to solve the issue, but I've started trying tackling some of this in context of code of conducts affecting many sofware communities: https://github.com/ContributorCovenant/contributor_covenant/...
In In Support of Richard Stallman
tokenizerrr·Feb 17, 2017
Sure. The person who started promoting the concept of code of conducts, "Coraline Ada", has been hunting down people who violate their view of what's "right". For example pressuring third party projects to remove maintainers because they are "publicly calling trans people out" on twitter. https://github.com/opal/opal/issues/941 There is this other very interesting example where Coraline got called out doing the very things she despises: https://github.com/ContributorCovenant/contributor_covenant/... This is of course perfectly acceptable.
In Go CoC updated to remove “punitive language and anonymous reporting mechanism”
tzs·Jan 19, 2016
(This story became flagged between the time I finished this comment and the time I submitted it. I used "vouch" to unflag so I could post the comment anyway, then "unvouch" to undo my vouch. While it was vouched, it got upvotes and this comment got upvotes, leading me to believe that there is interest in discussing this, but I'll leave it to others to make that decision) The proposed code of conduct is terrible, because of this unclear section: This Code of Conduct applies both within project spaces and in public spaces when an individual is representing the project or its community. What is a "public space" and what counts as "representing the project or its community"? For example, suppose Alice [1] is a core contributor to PHP and they adopt this code of conduct as written. On her Facebook public biographical information she
Read the rest
proudly lists her PHP affiliation. She also mentions her hobby of writing adult-oriented Harry Potter fan fiction, and links to her stories at fanfiction.net. These stories are full of sexualized language and imagery. Her author page at fanfiction.net also cites her PHP affiliation. Is Facebook a "public space"? Is fanfiction.net a "public space"? Is listing her PHP affiliation on those sties count as "representing the project or its community"? This is not just a theoretical issue. The author of that code of conduct submitted an issue to a project on Github that was not using a code of conduct trying to convince them to remove someone who tweeted something she thought was transphobic, on the grounds that he mentioned the project in his Twitter profile and so his statements reflect on the project [2]. [1] I'm using Alice as a generic name here. If there are any people named Alice who are PHP contributors, this is not a reference to them. [2] https://github.com/opal/opal/issues/941 PS: Swift is using the same code of conduct. I sent them an email asking how they interpret these things, and their response was: We want to clarify with you that “representing the project or its community” in the context of “public spaces” refers to behavior at Swift-oriented events, and not to individual social/online profiles or unrelated interests. PPS: The author of this code of conduct has stated that version 1.4 will expand that unclear section by adding: Due to their strong association with the project, core contributors are always seen as actively representing it. See https://github.com/CoralineAda/contributor_covenant/issues/1...
In On the Proposed PHP Code of Conduct
duncan_bayne·Dec 2, 2015
My reply in full: ===== Coraline, Many of the stated goals of the social justice movement are noble. I hope that everyone involved in open source projects would support the idea that we need to eliminate barriers that have, for no good reason, historically prevented people from participation. What those opposed to the SJ movement in general take issue with is that the SJ movement isn’t just about those goals. It is becoming a means to silence people, a means to create the very sort of oppression of dissent that has so frequently been targeted at the minorities the SJ movement claims to represent. To take a concrete example, you wrote: “They are working to improve the state of open source from the inside.” In what way would you say your actions during the OpalGate saga were working towards improving the state of open source? A contributor
Read the rest
to the project made a statement in public with which you disagreed. You then directly petitioned the project maintainers to eject him from the project[1]. I then raised a pull request[2] on your covenant, in an attempt to spell out that this sort of thing (penalising a contributor for speech outside the context of a project) was an unintended consequence of the system. It clearly wasn’t; the PR was rejected. Effectively “wontfix: by design”. To be blunt: based on observations of outspoken SJWs like yourself, hackers like myself think that there is an unspoken delta between your stated aims (which as I’ve said are often noble), and your practice, which is to use open source projects as a weapon against their contributors when they behave in politically unacceptable ways (e.g. OpalGate and Brendan Eich). [1] https://github.com/opal/opal/issues/941 [2] https://github.com/CoralineAda/contributor_covenant/pull/74 =====
In Why Hackers Must Welcome Social Justice Advocates
duncan_bayne·Dec 2, 2015
My reply to Coraline: ===== Coraline, Many of the stated goals of the social justice movement are noble. I hope that everyone involved in open source projects would support the idea that we need to eliminate barriers that have, for no good reason, historically prevented people from participation. What those opposed to the SJ movement in general take issue with is that the SJ movement isn’t just about those goals. It is becoming a means to silence people, a means to create the very sort of oppression of dissent that has so frequently been targeted at the minorities the SJ movement claims to represent. To take a concrete example, you wrote: “They are working to improve the state of open source from the inside.” In what way would you say your actions during the OpalGate saga were working towards improving the state of open source? A contribu
Read the rest
tor to the project made a statement in public with which you disagreed. You then directly petitioned the project maintainers to eject him from the project[1]. I then raised a pull request[2] on your covenant, in an attempt to spell out that this sort of thing (penalising a contributor for speech outside the context of a project) was an unintended consequence of the system. It clearly wasn’t; the PR was rejected. Effectively “wontfix: by design”. To be blunt: based on observations of outspoken SJWs like yourself, hackers like myself think that there is an unspoken delta between your stated aims (which as I’ve said are often noble), and your practice, which is to use open source projects as a weapon against their contributors when they behave in politically unacceptable ways (e.g. OpalGate and Brendan Eich). [1] https://github.com/opal/opal/issues/941 [2] https://github.com/CoralineAda/contributor_covenant/pull/74 =====
In Why Hackers Must Welcome Social Justice Advocates

MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME

A few shortcuts

/
Search the collection
?
Open this guide
Esc
Close dialogs and navigation

Your saved repositories and interests stay in this browser.