> Most of us can afford to pay it too. That's the real tragedy.
I think the hardest part for me is: I use soooooo much open-source software, that I can't contribute to all of them. Don't get me wrong, I should contribute more than I do, and I'm not excusing myself, but it's a legitimate problem. I'm sure people smarter than me have debated models for this, but I still don't think we have a good answer.
Please, please donate to the library developers. Scan the dependencies for some of your favourite packages and see if there's anything common to a few that might not be obvious. SDL backs so many things, for example, but rarely gets called out.
All of us should consider doing something similar, allocate a couple $ a month and give it to people who make our lives/jobs easier or better.