We want the free software movement to keep growing and one facet of successful movement building is embracing a multi-generational community. The good news is that there is no age requirement for using, promoting and contributing to free software. The bad news is that we aren't always doing a great job of facilitating a diverse, inter-generational movement. We'll take a look at what we're currently doing to bring in young people, how we are treating older people in our communities and where there is room for improvement. Using examples from other movements and inter-generational communities, we'll identify tactics that aren't being used to build the free software community and see what we can collectively port over. We plan to inspire the audience to find ways to recruit and retain young people, inspire older people to participate and maintain an unbroken thread of free software conservatorship. If the long-term success of the free software movement is important to you, then you should come to this talk!

1. All Ages: How to Build a
Movement
Deb Nicholson & Molly de Blanc

2. #allagesfoss
@baconandcoconut
@mmillions

3. tl;dr
We believe that, in order to be successful, the
FOSS movement needs to be diverse and
inclusive, bringing together a spectrum of people
from different backgrounds and experiences.

4. What we’re going to cover
Why we care
What’s going on with age?
Solutions we like

5. Why We Care

6. Fair Use from The Force Awakens, Copyright Disney

7. Movement vs Tools

8. Philosophy vs
Development model

9. GFDL by Ildar Sagdejev from Wikipedia 2009-03-21, Beer brewing bubbles

10. CC.BY “Zombie Run” by mebrett on Flickr

11. Diversity & Inclusivity

12. “Diversity jolts us into cognitive
action in ways that homogeneity
simply does not.”
From Scientific American, “How Diversity Makes Us
Smarter” by Katherine W. Phillips on October 1st, 2014

13. “To neutralize exclusion, leaders need to
proactively review the access of all groups of
employees to training, professional
development, networks, important
committees, nominations for honors, and
other opportunities. ”
From Harvard Business Review, “Diversity is Useless Without
Inclusivity” by Christine M. Riordan on June 5th, 2014

14. CC.BY_With Arms Wide Open by Gregg O'Connell

15. CC.BY.SA by Peretz Partensky, Power Strip on Flickr

16. What is intersectionality?
Minorities in Tech
or

17. Who is a minority in tech?
In the US: Everyone who is not a heteronormative, white, man.
In the rest of the world: I don’t know.

18. Who is a minority in tech?
An incomplete list
Gender Race/Ethnicity Background
● women
● trans
● gender queer
● non-binary
● People of Color (POC)
● First, Indigenous,
Native People*
● Latinx
● people with disabilities
● non-college graduates
● non-technical education
or skills
● people over age 35
● working class

19. Intersectionality
The mindsets, institutional policies, and behaviors that marginalize one
group frequently are or are connected to mindsets, institutional policies that
marginalize other groups.

20. Intersectionality
Oppressive institutions are interconnected.
But!
We still need to talk about things separately sometimes.

21. What’s going on with age?

22. Tech has an age problem
“I want to stress the importance of being young and technical. Young people
are just smarter. Why are most chess masters under 30? I don't know. Young
people just have simpler lives. We may not own a car. We may not have
family. Simplicity in life allows you to focus on what's important. “
-Mark Zuckerberg, 2007, age 22/23

23. Tech has an age problem
“People under 35 are the people who make change happen, and older
entrepreneurs fail to innovate because they are falling back on old habits.”
-Vinod Khosla, 2011, age 56

24. Tech has an age problem
In 2011, Google reached a multi-million dollar settlement...with Brian Reid...
Reid claimed that Google employees made derogatory comments about his
age, telling him he was ‘obsolete,’ ‘sluggish,’ and an ‘old fuddy-duddy’ whose
ideas were ‘too old to matter.’ Other companies...have gotten themselves in
hot water by posting job listings with ‘new grad‘ in the description. In 2013,
Facebook settled a case...over a job listing for an attorney that noted ‘Class of
2007 or 2008 preferred.'”
Griswold, Alice. “Former Twitter Employee Sues the Company for Age Discrimination.” Slate.com. (2014)

25. Tech has an age problem
Median employee age (2012)
Facebook: 26 IBM: 37
Google: 29 Oracle: 38
Apple, Nvidia: 31 HP: 39
payscale.com

26. The Young (Ones)
Fair Use from The Young Ones, Copyright BBC

27. The Young (Ones)
Fair use, Koolaid logo

28. The Young (Ones)
CC.BY.SA, Jade sleeps on the Dell, by Christopher Browns on
flickr

29. The Young (Ones)
CC.BY.SA Birthday Cake by CJ Sorg, from Flickr.com

30. The Young (Ones)
Fair Use, Wesley Crusher from Star Trek, Copyright Gene Rodenberry

31. The Young (Ones)
Fair Use from Harry Potter, Copyright Warner Brothers Pictures

32. The Young (Ones)
Fair use from Hackers United Artists

33. The Young (Ones)

34. Some solutions we like
The Olds
Fair Use from The Golden Girls, Copyright AP Photos

35. Some solutions we like
The Olds
"Discriminating against older workers, men and women,
is the one kind of discrimination that seems to be
socially acceptable, especially in tech. You have to work
hard to not hire anyone over 30 but just about every
startup in Silicon Valley manages to do it."
From a 2015 interview I conducted with 57 year-old woman who works as a
systems administrator

36. Some solutions we like
“I’m too old for this shit.”
Fair Use, Danny Glover as Sgt. Roger Murtaugh in Lethal Weapon

37. Some solutions we like
The Olds
"Now it is all about how can I use my experience to help
other people work on their big important projects… It is
like my only use is to train people to replace me.”
From a 2015 interview I conducted with 50 year-old woman who works as a
software engineer at big data company

38. Volunteering
Free software is powered by volunteers.

39. Volunteering
Photo courtesy of Virginia State Parks. CC-BY

40. Volunteering
Youths
55% ages 12-18
29 hours per year
64% in youth or religious organizations
250 volunteer hours (over high school) is “not impressive, but laudable.”
Corporation for National and Community Service; Collegeconfidential.com

41. Volunteering
Retirees
42% aged 65+
96 hours / per year
Many in religious orgs
10% of elderly volunteers accrue >500 hours /per year
Serviceleader.org

42. Volunteering

43. Volunteering
Younger people and older people like to use their time to do good.

44. Some solutions we like

45. Fair Use from The Force Awakens, Copyright Disney

46. Some great stuff happening to get young
people involved
● Penn Manor
● OSU’s Open Source Lab & DevOps bootcamps
● Maker Days
● Scratch, Minecraft, ???
● Kids’ Days at big FOSS conferences

47. Some great stuff happening to get older
people involved
● Outreachy
● Opensource.com
● edX & Code Academy (& similar programs)
● Volunteering with community run conferences

48. Some stuff that isn’t necessarily age-specific
● Boot Camps
● Online Learning
● Meet-ups
● FOSS conferences

49. Some stuff that we’d like to see happening
● Ways for kids to do non-code stuff
● More places for older people to do non-code stuff;
writing, accounting, event work
● More support for Moms returning to the work
force
● Youth/Junior affinity groups within communities
● All ages social events at FOSS conferences

50. This is the Important Part
Call to Action
or

51. Fair Use from Doctor Who, Copyright BBC

52. Fair Use from Fringe, Copyright Fox

53. #allagesfoss
@mmillions
@baconandcoconut

54. Questions?
A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, by Georges Seurat