I no longer maintain my Emacs projects on Sourcehut

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Hosting choices & practicality

  • Many see the move away from Sourcehut as a pragmatic choice: pick the forge whose trade‑offs best fit your project and audience.
  • Several commenters use a simple rule: “If I want contributors and visibility, use GitHub; otherwise, anything else (self‑host, Gitea/Forgejo, Sourcehut, bare git).”
  • Some emphasize that code hosting is trivial; the hard part is hosting issues, reviews, and discussions well.

GitHub’s dominance & social aspects

  • GitHub is described as a de facto social network for developers: stars, feeds, and discoverability drive engagement and contributions.
  • Network effects matter: contributors often don’t want “another account” or unfamiliar UI.
  • Some dislike Microsoft and AI training, but still feel compelled to stay because “that’s where the people are.”

GitLab impressions

  • Mixed views: praised for self‑hosting and business workflows, but criticized as slow, cluttered, and more company‑oriented than community‑oriented.
  • Pricing and earlier feature restrictions (like limiting anonymous issue search) deter hobby and OSS use.

Sourcehut workflow & UX

  • Supporters value its email‑centric, minimalist, “works for its users” approach and deliberate rejection of GitHub‑style interaction.
  • Critics find the UI archaic, navigation awkward, attachment handling poor, and patch‑via‑email workflows confusing for newcomers.
  • Some argue the friction selectively attracts serious contributors; others say it just kills small but valuable contributions.

Mailing lists vs web-based collaboration

  • Mailing lists are praised as open, federated, and good for nuanced technical discussion, with git tooling integration.
  • Downsides raised: subscription friction, inbox noise, poor search for newcomers, “reply vs reply‑all/list” confusion, mbox hassles.
  • Several say mailing lists are fine for established, contributor‑rich projects, but off‑putting for new ones.

Contributors, friction & project goals

  • Some project owners deliberately prefer higher barriers to filter spam and entitlement.
  • Others want the lowest friction possible to encourage drive‑by fixes and documentation tweaks.

Alternatives & lock‑in concerns

  • Forgejo, Gitea, Codeberg, Fossil, and self‑hosted Forgejo/Gitea or bare git are mentioned as promising or sufficient, though community and drama issues are noted.
  • Commenters worry about monoculture and future GitHub “enshittification,” and wish for better cross‑forge interoperability (issues, PRs, and reviews, not just git pushes).