This backports namespace reserves a namespace beneath which we can happily place all of the various features that we want to cut-and-paste from later Python versions. I hope that this will provide two benefits: 1. It should provide greater sanity, and a bit more organization, in the Package Index. 2. When you are ready to port a Python application to a new version of Python, you can search the code for any import statements that name a backports package, and remove the backports for features that have now "arrived" in the version of Python to which you are upgrading.