Hacktoberfest, a month-long celebration of open source software that encourages OSS enthusiasts and beginners alike to contribute to projects, seems like the perfect opportunity for first time contributors to start participating in open source... but what are some ways you can add to a project while you’re still learning?

Join us Thursday, October 21 at 1 p.m. ET / 10 a.m. PT as Tidelift ecosystem strategy lead Josh Simmons and maintainer Isabel Costa sit down to discuss this topic. Josh will share some stats from a recent maintainer-only survey about the areas where maintainers need help most. Spoiler alert: it involves documentation and testing. Isabel will share what sorts of pull requests she’s most likely to merge. Josh and Isabel will also discuss ways maintainers might be able to make Hacktoberfest a success for their projects.

This will be a fun, casual discussion in which Josh and Isabel will explore:

• Why do people contribute to open source?
• What is the definition of a meaningful contribution? 
• What are some good first steps someone can contribute? 
• What areas do maintainers most need help with?

Bonus: RSVP and attend, and we’ll send U.S.-based attendees our newest Pay the Maintainers t-shirt!