OpenClaw began as an experiment and quickly grew into one of the fastest-growing open source projects in GitHub history. As contributions scaled, its maintainers had to rethink how they review code, build trust with contributors, manage AI-generated pull requests, and secure the project and its dependencies.

In a new conversation, OpenClaw creator Peter Steinberger and maintainers share what they’ve learned about maintaining an open source project when contributions can arrive faster than people can review them. They discuss how AI is changing the contributor experience, how pull requests are becoming “prompt requests,” why showing your work matters and how agents can help both contributors and maintainers move faster.

They also share insight from participating in the GitHub Secure Open Source Fund, and the value of learning from security experts and connecting with maintainers facing similar challenges.

Read our blog recap for the top 10 lessons that we took away from the conversation: OpenClaw Went Viral. Meet the Maintainers Building and Securing It.

Make sure you also check out the full conversation to hear directly from the OpenClaw’s maintainers reflecting back on their first 6 months.

🌟 Join the discussion

What would you like to ask the OpenClaw maintainers?

You might be curious about how they review and triage large volumes of AI-assisted contributions, how they decide when to accept or revise agent-generated code, or how contributors can build trust with the project in this AI landscape.

Add your questions in the comments below! Members of the OpenClaw maintenance team will be joining the discussion and responding throughout the week!

We’ll close the discussion on Thursday, September 3, 2026, so please share your questions before then.

❤️ Meet the maintainers

The following maintainers shared their experiences maintaining and securing OpenClaw:

• Peter Steinberger, Creator of OpenClaw
• Brad Groux, CEO, Digital Meld
• Josh Avant, Member of technical staff, OpenClaw Foundation
• Josh Lehman, Martian Engineering
• Sally O’Malley, Principal software engineer at Red Hat
• Val Alexandar, OpenClaw maintainer
• Vincent Koc, Chief architect, OpenClaw Foundation

Ensure you show them some love! 🦞