Enthusiastic SO user here. The fact that the data is available puts SO in the same category as open source software for me.
I use open source for all my tools of choice. My browser, editor, programming language, libraries, web framework, server operating system, etc etc are all open source. I get tens of thousands of dollars in value from open source.
In gratitude for that, and to keep the ball rolling, I do spend some effort contributing back to open source.
StackOverflow is no different, to me. The info on SO has saved me many hours of frustration and taught me lots of new things. Answering questions (and asking good ones) is my way of giving back.
And in both cases, it's partly selfish, too: whatever I contribute back to open source or to StackOverflow is not lost to me when I move to the next job.
Sure, I've given many hours to StackOverflow. But it's given many more hours to me in saved time. I want to keep that around.
I use open source for all my tools of choice. My browser, editor, programming language, libraries, web framework, server operating system, etc etc are all open source. I get tens of thousands of dollars in value from open source.
In gratitude for that, and to keep the ball rolling, I do spend some effort contributing back to open source.
StackOverflow is no different, to me. The info on SO has saved me many hours of frustration and taught me lots of new things. Answering questions (and asking good ones) is my way of giving back.
And in both cases, it's partly selfish, too: whatever I contribute back to open source or to StackOverflow is not lost to me when I move to the next job.
Sure, I've given many hours to StackOverflow. But it's given many more hours to me in saved time. I want to keep that around.