"ngscopeclient certainly has been a net loss to me, we've got some donations but nowhere near enough to even cover what i've personally spent on the project much less the value of my time and that of all of the other contributors"

I and presumably many others, probably can echo similar sentiments?

For me at least, the "net loss" part of open source isn't really a thing though.

It's like: real wealth is health. I am grateful I am not currently afflicted with any major maladies! I can't understate how important that is given how much else in my human incarnation is awful.

The "powers that be" those "vested interests" with money to burn on A"I" or whatever? I dunno, it's seemingly impossible to ignore them. Like pop music, I can never buy the vinyl from such "artists", but I'll probably still hear the crappy tunes all over the place?

I can, and do my best to filter out a lot of the BS; but for me, what's really vital?

Fresh air!

Clean water!

Healthy (vegan) food in my belly.

The rest of it? I would really like less noise pollution. Less light pollution. A solitary shelter without shared walls I can call my own; but even when I had a vehicle and was sleeping in that?

Assholes, would break into my car and steal what limited material possessions I would leave in it, time and time again.

So; I don't know. Better seems as if it may be possible, just not for me in this incarnation. Too many thieves and liars and others who do not respect personal space, boundaries, possessions. I am not a fighter, and unfortunately for me, even when I thought i was dead, I have been recorporealized. Seemingly doomed to continue to exist in a continually marginalized hell.

I'm not going to actively make things worse for myself or others though. Vengeance is not meaningfully useful either.

Heck, I don't even know if libre/free open source software is particularly useful. I just think it's not as bad as the alternatives.