diff --git a/doc/release/contribs.py b/doc/release/contribs.py
index 08a59fc9..c92ac7ca 100755
--- a/doc/release/contribs.py
+++ b/doc/release/contribs.py
@@ -5,16 +5,17 @@ import string
 import shlex
 
 if len(sys.argv) != 2:
-    print "Usage: ./contributors.py tag-of-previous-release"
+    print("Usage: ./contributors.py tag-of-previous-release")
     sys.exit(-1)
 
 tag = sys.argv[1]
 
 def call(cmd):
-    return subprocess.check_output(shlex.split(cmd)).split('\n')
+    print(shlex.split(cmd))
+    return subprocess.check_output(shlex.split(cmd), universal_newlines=True).split('\n')
 
 tag_date = call("git show --format='%%ci' %s" % tag)[0]
-print "Release %s was on %s" % (tag, tag_date)
+print("Release %s was on %s" % (tag, tag_date))
 
 merges = call("git log --since='%s' --merges --format='>>>%%B' --reverse" % tag_date)
 merges = [m for m in merges if m.strip()]
@@ -22,27 +23,26 @@ merges = '\n'.join(merges).split('>>>')
 merges = [m.split('\n')[:2] for m in merges]
 merges = [m for m in merges if len(m) == 2 and m[1].strip()]
 
-print "\nIt contained the following %d merges:" % len(merges)
-print
+print("\nIt contained the following %d merges:\n" % len(merges))
 for (merge, message) in merges:
     if merge.startswith('Merge pull request #'):
         PR = ' (%s)' % merge.split()[3]
     else:
         PR = ''
 
-    print '- ' + message + PR
+    print('- ' + message + PR)
 
 
-print "\nMade by the following committers [alphabetical by last name]:\n"
+print("\nMade by the following committers [alphabetical by last name]:\n")
 
 authors = call("git log --since='%s' --format=%%aN" % tag_date)
 authors = [a.strip() for a in authors if a.strip()]
 
 def key(author):
-    author = [v for v in author.split() if v[0] in string.letters]
+    author = [v for v in author.split() if v[0] in string.ascii_letters]
     return author[-1]
 
 authors = sorted(set(authors), key=key)
 
 for a in authors:
-    print '-', a
+    print('- ' + a)