I was on In Beta a while ago, and we talked about the “guilt” that comes with maintaining open source projects. I feel both intensely passionate and exceptionally guilty with how I contribute to open source. I love getting patches into new projects, and the needs of existing projects are demanding.

An open source contributor doesn’t feel guilt as in a crime, but guilt as in time: What is best to spend your yours on? Steve Klabnik has a strategy for dealing with a limited amount of time:

The basic idea is this: you try to minimize the things that are bad, and maximize those that are good.

My strategy has built on Steve’s: minimize the guilt of open source, maximize the passion from open source. I’ve been thinking a lot about what creates passion, and what builds up guilt. It’s also worth considering what destroys passion, and what can tear down guilt.