LIBBY:  So open source should be like roller derby.  I don't 
mean this.  This is the 1970s derby.  In the '70s it was a 
no-holds barred, race around the track.  Problem no problem, 
just grab their hair and take them down.  A little too fast, 
knock them in the head.  Fortunately a lot -- this version of 
the sport kind of died out when people stopped being paid to 
play roller derby.  And you can still play it in a few places 
but generally, skaters aren't interested because it seems really 
scary and dangerous.  And I would say, yeah, there are analogues 
in open source but no, I'm talking about flat-track derby.  
Modern flat-track derby.  And it's a real spot.  It's 
fast-paced, full contact, and it has rules to help people stay 
safe and it also has a really awesome collaborative culture.  
Derby culture's awesome.  Like open source, it's mostly 
volunteers.  It's by the skaters for the skaters.  There's no, 
like, CEO directing everything.  It's always very inclusive.  
Open source projects can learn from on you roller derby 
encourages beginners, values teamwork and empowers participants. 
 Roller derby is really great at supporting beginners, and 
that's something that I started to think about as a beginner to 
open source.  Like open source, roller derby can be kind of 
intimidating.  So it's really important for us to help beginners 
get started.  And -- but the thing is, beginner still can't 
practice with a team right away.  That would be like letting 
someone who wasn't good at all just run around in your 
production code base, except in our case, you can literally 
break a leg.  It also sets the beginner up for failure, which is 
no fun.  Instead, beginners are shown the skills that they need 
and a path for acquiring those skills.  My league actually had 
weekly classes to teach people how to skate but probably most 
open source projects don't want to teach people to code from 
scratch.  But still, they can help beginners by having lots of 
documentation, being clear about how to contribute, and giving 
back feedback and communicating.  Playing roller derby has 
taught me a lot about teamwork on and off the track and it's 
really helpful I think with open source, too.  Pairing is really 
powerful.  In this gif here you can pretend that the girl in 
black is a really tricky bug.  And the skaters in white are 
managing to isolate here and eliminate her.  Unfortunately in 
derby, that bug's just going to come back around and re-emerge 
but unfortunately, that happens in real life, too.  Also when 
you're working with others, you can push your teammates to write 
clear and maintainable code.  But the thing to remember is, in 
derby, when we're pushing people through the pack like this, 
we've practiced pushing each other safely so that you don't just 
knock somebody over.  And you can think about that in open 
source as not being like, "Wow your code sucks."  By instead 
being like, "Here's how you can improve it."  Sorry, I like 
stretching metaphors so much.  You can also give each momentum 
when you're feeling burnt-out.  Roller derby also has teamwork 
off the track.  Skaters share the responsibilities of organizing 
the league, doing the paperwork and stuff like that that doesn't 
involve hitting people.  But it also means that the bus factor 
is really high.  You can have one of your skaters get pregnant 
and it's still okay.
          There's also a lot of mentorship in roller derby.  
Individual skaters, and at least in my league were assigned a 
derby mom.  And so if they had any questions about what their 
role was in the league or if they had any issues, then they had 
a single person that they could go to and they didn't have to 
feel nervous about talking to them, but regional leagues also 
had mentor leagues.  And so our league mentored smaller towns, 
and we had other leagues -- and other leagues copied models from 
each other.  And I thought it would be cool for open source to 
have one-on-one mentoring not just for contributors but also for 
maintainers.  When people talk about why they play roller derby 
and why they love roller derby, they often talk about how 
empowering it is.  People play roller derby who never felt 
comfortable playing a sport in their lives.  One thing that you 
hear over and over again is that the reason they feel empowered 
is that they believe able to do things that they never thought 
they could do.  So here's me down here on the floor during the 
first game, and believe it or not it was a huge step for me so 
even get here.  I never thought that I would actually play 
roller derby and I joined up.  I just thought, "I just want to 
skate.  I thought that sounds fun.  I'll just quit as soon as I 
have to hit people."  But my teammates were like, but you're 
awesome at hitting people!" So I stuck around.  And I'm glad I 
did because eventually I spent less time on the floor and 
started taking leadership roles.  So here, I'm the person who's 
scoring points.  This is a huge moment for me because that 
person back there is "Hemorrhoidal Rage."  He was an amazing 
skater, and I never would have thought that a few years before I 
could ever be passing her on the track.  But the key thing is, 
the reason that I could pass her on the took is my teammate here 
who helps me out.  And so that's, like -- a constant theme is, 
like, you have to support each other, especially when you're 
talking about somebody who doesn't think that they can do it but 
you know they can.  You gotta give them that verbal 
encouragement.  And you also gotta challenge them a little bit 
to go outside of their comfort zone by saying, "I know you can 
do it."  And you also have to be trustworthy.  You have to know 
that if the same person who's saying, "You can do it" is going 
to also support you when I inevitably mess up.  I'm wondering 
can open source be empowering like that?  Maybe it seems like a 
bit of a stretch.  But starting a career is really hard when 
you're starting in a group that's marginalized in tech or if you 
don't have a CS background, and open source could be a way for 
us to get started but instead they feel intimidated and they 
feel that they couldn't do it and they need some extra help.  
This remote thing isn't working.  So what does it look like when 
an open source project embodies these values, they encourage and 
support beginners, make contributing less intimidating.  And 
they help contributors increase their skills and they're 
radically inclusive.  I did say that roller derby was inclusive 
but there are areas where it could be better.  And there's no 
reason where it couldn't be even more inclusive.  That's what 
technology is for, right?  So I want to give a shout out to the 
first project I ever contributed to, which is Dreamwidth which 
is a forked-up Livejournal.  They're really super friendly 
community that basically held my hand through my first patch and 
they're really open to beginners.  In conclusion open source 
good but we can make it better if we really tried.  Thank you.