[Q] Squeak feature bounties

Russell Allen mail at russell-allen.com
Tue Mar 7 00:28:55 UTC 2006


Hi,

I've been a lurker and user of Squeak since the 1.x days, and have built
up a large list of small and large changes and features I would like to
see made available in Squeak.

I simply do not have the time nor the necessary skills to implement my
wishlist. I suspect many people are the same.

I have been thinking lately about Software Bounties. Increasingly, large
open source projects are providing mechanisms for people to put up a
bounty for a particular feature - the first person to implement the
feature gets the bounty. The feature is then made available to everyone
under the standard open source licence.

Examples:

* http://www.gnome.org/bounties/
* http://www.ubuntu.com/developers/bounties
* http://bountycounty.org/

The bounties aren't equivalent to the commercial cost of writing the
software, so it is not a straight forward case of hiring a programmer.

Bounties can range from the simple to the economically sophisticated
(http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2005/05/assurance_contr.html,
http://www.fundable.org/).

I suspect that the success of a Squeak bounty would depend on the
available excess of programming 'capital' (ie, how many Squeakers have
free time and inclination to step up and develop). I don't know how much
free resources the community has.

Although I am sadly not a billionare like Mark Shuttleworth :) I am
prepared to put some money at least where my mouth is if I thought it
would work.

What are the opinions of the people on this list?

Best wishes,

Russell

mail at russell-allen.com





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