There are a ton of reasons not to develop in the open, no matter what your structure.
- You're experimenting
- You don't want comments from the peanut gallery while things are in progress
- It is not for external use, specific to an institution or project, or otherwise nobody else will care
- It deals with something sensitive
- You've made an agreement with someone else that requires it
- etc. etc. etc.
People seem to have weird notions about nonprofits. Your tax structure doesn't change the fact that you operate in a world of other human beings.
mostly these reasons. We also want to make sure that code we open source is properly documented, has appropriate functional tests, and is useful outside of our organization. Our typical workflow is to build a POC, then an MVP, then build out documentation and unit tests.
- You're experimenting - You don't want comments from the peanut gallery while things are in progress - It is not for external use, specific to an institution or project, or otherwise nobody else will care - It deals with something sensitive - You've made an agreement with someone else that requires it - etc. etc. etc.
People seem to have weird notions about nonprofits. Your tax structure doesn't change the fact that you operate in a world of other human beings.