People get involved with open source for a variety of reasons. Some want the noteriety, some want the resume points, some want the tool to work better. Still others have a problem with the tool, like Karelia does, and want to fix that one problem. That is why I submitted my one patch to the ANT build system - a bug was getting in my way.

If someone wants to improve webkit for their own reasons, but they do not have a specific bug to fix, then they might want to fix one of Karelia’s bugs. The money will not cover the effort, but they would not have gotten paid for their efforts anyway. Getting a bit of cash seems better than no cash, and if one of your goals is a job offer from a mac software company, fixing webkit bugs might just get that. It is always good to be known as someone who can fix problems.

Karelia made it clear that they are not in the business of fixing webkit bugs. I suspect that they picked the numbers as about what it would cost them to code up a cheesy, but usable, workaround. A for-real fix is better, as then the problem is solved forever, but a for-real fix would cost more. If the bounty entices someone to fix the problem, then they do not need to spend time on a cheesy fix.

Scott

[1] It just doesn’t seem that, for someone who is capable of fixing these types of bugs, it would be worth their time.

[2] Perhaps more importantly, would it really be that hard for Karelia to up the bounty? It’s a short list of bugs, and they are only paying for confirmed fixes.

But overall, I think it’s a great idea. I don’t think Karelia is doing anything slimey, but it just comes off as a little weak. “Spend hours and hours solving this obscure bug that paid apple engineers haven’t gotten around to fixing, in order to help our comercial product, and we will pay you what you billed for 2 hours of setting up a wireless network when you were 20″.

But then again, how long have I spent on this blog post… okay back to work…

I think it’s really cool what the Karelia guys are doing.