[FFmpeg-devel] Re: FFmpeg has been selected for the 2025 Spotify FOSS

[Kieran Kunhya via ffmpeg-devel <ffmpeg-devel@ffmpeg.org>]

On Wed, Dec 24, 2025 at 4:56 PM Sara Tazari via ffmpeg-devel
<ffmpeg-devel@ffmpeg.org> wrote:
>
> Hi FFmpeg maintainers,
>
> I’m Sara, a member of the open source team at Spotify, along with Dave
> Zolotusky, Principal Engineer. In 2022, we started the Spotify FOSS Fund
> <https://engineering.atspotify.com/2024/11/congratulations-to-the-recipients-of-the-2024-spotify-foss-fund>
> as
> a way of giving back to the open source community and to provide
> maintainers with funds that will allow them to continue the maintenance of
> their projects. Recipients were nominated and voted on by Spotify employees
> and selected by an internal committee.
>
> We’re excited to let you know that FFmpeg has been selected as a recipient
> of the 2025 Spotify FOSS Fund!
>
> We are in the process of providing you, the maintainers, with 30,000 Euros
> to put towards maintaining and continuing the success of FFmpeg. We will be
> announcing the winners on our public Spotify channels by the end of January
> 2026. For the purposes of our announcement, could you provide responses to
> any of the following questions:

Hello,

Thank you for your donation!
Here are my comments (which hopefully are a fair reflection of the
opinion of the community)

>    What is the vision for the project?

FFmpeg aims to play every multimedia file ever made. As a result of
this goal it is used widely, from both hobbyists encoding their
personal videos to some of the largest streaming services like
Youtube, Netflix, X, Spotify etc.

>    How will these funds go toward supporting the future of the project?

FFmpeg is written almost entirely by volunteers and so funding is important.
Funding will be used for:

Hardware purchases
Travel to conferences
Funding development projects

>    What kind of impact do you think FOSS funds have on the open source
>    ecosystem in general? Is any amount welcome? In addition to the money, does
>    exposure from the fund provide value, as well?

Many FOSS projects like FFmpeg are developed by volunteers and so
funding helps pay for day-to-day expenses.

FFmpeg has received donations from well known names like Spotify,
Bloomberg and Zerodha and their association helps increase awareness
of the importance of FFmpeg. It also provides value to these companies
as it shows they care about the wider open source projects they rely
upon in their businesses.

>    What are other ways you think the community and/or companies can better
>    support open source?

While we are extremely thankful for the donation from Spotify, there
continues to be sustainability challenges in open source projects,
especially with long-term and reliable funding to pay for full-time
developers. We hope companies can provide dedicated developers and/or
repeatable funding to pay for this.

Regards,
Kieran Kunhya
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