Microsoft opens a "high priority" bug ticket in ffmpeg, attempting to leech the free labour of the maintainers - eviltoast

Microsoft employee:

Hi, This is a high priority ticket and the FFmpeg version is currently used in a highly visible product in Microsoft. We have customers experience issues with Caption during Teams Live Event. Please help

Maintainer’s comment on twitter:

After politely requesting a support contract from Microsoft for long term maintenance, they offered a one-time payment of a few thousand dollars instead.

This is unacceptable.

And further:

The lesson from the xz fiasco is that investments in maintenance and sustainability are unsexy and probably won’t get a middle manager their promotion but pay off a thousandfold over many years.

But try selling that to a bean counter

  • lysdexic@programming.dev
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    8 months ago

    They made a demand, based on a product launch time line.

    If you read the same bug report I read, you wouldn’t make that claim. They expressed their personal needs, which are their own and theirs alone, and don’t extend beyond their personal roadmap.

    This is absurdly rude (…)

    The issue stated they found a bug that they had to get fixed. They said it was important to them for their own personal reasons. It’s laughable to describe what amounts to a run-of-the-mill bug report as “absurdly rude”.

    Do you actually work on software for a living?

    treating open source like slave labor

    I’m sorry, what? Do you even pay attention to what you’re writing?