Throughout my career as a professional software developer, Open Source Software has been at the core of what I've been doing. I've been contributing to small projects end of the 1990s, but the important turning point for me was when I joined the – then very young – TYPO3 project in 2001.

When I was in my twenties, it was very easy to spend hundreds of hours with my favorite Open Source project. I didn't need much for a living and could basically spend all of my time with hacking, only shortly interrupted by a few customer projects I needed to attend to. That has changed a bit, now some 20 years later – I settled down, have a family … So I had to find a good transition into a new model.

Today I'm still spending almost all of my work time working with or on Open Source Software. When I founded the Neos Project a decade ago, I could only hope that it would become a project which improves the lives of many – not only through its features and financially, but also by the great community which it spawned.

I am very grateful for how things developed, and that our small team at Flownative still can dedicate a big part of our time with voluntary work on Neos. If you are considering sponsoring me, please do as a thank you for the work I did. The work to come is on me, because it goes without saying that contributing to Open Source projects is still one of the most rewarding activities one hardly can dare to call "work".