He used to be the Volunteer Coordinator for the GNUstep Project and acted as Publicity Director for Linux International. In 2000, Martin joined the Debian Project, and he was later elected Debian Project Leader (DPL) as which he acted for two years.

Martin holds Master degrees in Philosophy, Psychology and Software Engineering, and started a PhD at the University of Cambridge in January 2004. His research focuses on quality management in free software projects.