Posted on Oct 17 I'm a maintainer of a popular open source project, we're building an alternative to Typeform + Hotjar (here is the repo ⭐).Open Source contributions are really great because they have different advantages for different people involved. However, they also have a few downsides attached to them, which we try to address in a fun way: Making it a game!These are the problems which are recurring in different flavours:So far so good. We have addressed some of these issues in our first attempt to gamify contributions: The FormTribe hackathon!Our project is called "Frombricks", our Community "FormTribe".This October, we're running the FormTribe Hackathon. In a nutshell, it works like this:So far, this has worked reeeally well! At this point, we have significantly more people wanting to contribute than we have tickets available. We release an issue, reload the page, and someone wants to work on it already 😍 🚀This is enough for us to put some thought into how we could gamify the complete Contribution experience in our community:The idea is to wrap open source contributions into a habit loop: Trigger, Routine, Reward. In its simplest version it goes like this: See new issue notification (Trigger), create contribution (Routine), collect reward (Points). Restart.The points help you level up. With each level, you have a new set of rights and benefits.You can start collecting points by signing up via email. With a simple form you add your GitHub name and Twitter handle for us to bring everything together. You receive all kinds of instructions via email as well as a notifier, when we release a new issue which you could work on. We also share a list of side-quests you can perform to level up to Level 1 rather quickly;Points to reach Level 1: 250 (maybe 1h of work)Rights: Work on beginner issues, limited set of side quests to complete, GitHub badgeBenefits: Shoutout in Weekly / Monthly round upLimitations: Cannot work on intermediate issuesPoints to get to next Level: 1000Benefits: To celebrate they'll receive merch when leveling up + public shoutout, GitHub badgeRights: Work on intermediate issues, expanded set of side questsLimitations: Cannot work on issues with bountiesPoints to reach next level: 3000Benefits: More advanced merch (limited stuff) to celebrate leveling up, GitHub badgeRights: Work on all issues incl. ones with bounties ($)Limitations: -Points to reach next level: 7000Benefits, Rights and Limitations to be decided.With this level system and the benefits, rights and limitations attached to the levels, we solve quite a few of the problems listed above. What do you think?This is the point where we can take everyones feedback into account :)To support our project and see this gamefied concept become a thing, please star our repository ⭐!Templates let you quickly answer FAQs or store snippets for re-use.Seen so many projects come and go, building something sustainable for a contributor has always been lacking. This looks super promising and on the right track to solve it!What do you think of expanding it for other projects to have something similar like a plug-and-play module? A user can have different levels/badges for different projects (only those who participate).I think that'd be cool! We'll test what works for our community and should then enable other communities to do the same :) I'm really looking forward to this 🔥 It's amazing to see how gamification can drive the engagement of contributors. Are you sure you want to hide this comment? It will become hidden in your post, but will still be visible via the comment's permalink. Hide child comments as well Confirm For further actions, you may consider blocking this person and/or reporting abuse Onix-Systems - Oct 12 Ricardo Sueiras - Oct 16 Sarthak Sharma - Oct 15 Georgi Todorov - Oct 16 Once suspended, Jobenjada will not be able to comment or publish posts until their suspension is removed. Once unsuspended, jobenjada will be able to comment and publish posts again. Once unpublished, all posts by jobenjada will become hidden and only accessible to themselves. If jobenjada is not suspended, they can still re-publish their posts from their dashboard. Note: Once unpublished, this post will become invisible to the public and only accessible to Johannes. They can still re-publish the post if they are not suspended. Thanks for keeping DEV Community safe. Here is what you can do to flag jobenjada: jobenjada consistently posts content that violates DEV Community's code of conduct because it is harassing, offensive or spammy. Unflagging jobenjada will restore default visibility to their posts. DEV Community — A constructive and inclusive social network for software developers. With you every step of your journey. Built on Forem — the open source software that powers DEV and other inclusive communities.Made with love and Ruby on Rails. DEV Community © 2016 - 2023. We're a place where coders share, stay up-to-date and grow their careers.