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List:       kde-pim
Subject:    Re: Paid programmers in OS software? (was: Re: [Kde-pim] Recurring to-do items for KOrganizer?)
From:       Don Sanders <sanders () kde ! org>
Date:       2002-07-17 8:58:55
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I wouldn't worry too much about hurting the 'main authors' feelings. 
He quit contributing to KDE a few years ago when he ended up getting 
a real job to feed his family. I was sad to see him go.

Of course there's the other main author who is still around. Now it's 
true he never got paid for the code he generated, and it's true 
someone else got paid to add extra functionality to his program, 
someone who previously had never made any contributions to KDE. But 
the main author actually feels happy just to have other people 
contributing good open source code, no matter what their motivations 
or rewards were.

Yes I know you were only talking hypothetically, but now come to think 
of it, I'm not.

Don.

On Tuesday 16 July 2002 21:53, Holger Freyther wrote:
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>
> Am Tuesday 16 July 2002 13:35 schrieb André Somers:
> > Citeren Cornelius Schumacher <schumacher@kde.org>:
> > > Of course you can hire a programmer to develop something which
> > > is given back to KDE, but the original post was about a small
> > > amount of money, which probably isn't enough to really pay the
> > > development. The problem with such "prizes" for certain
> > > features is that it might be hard to tell who actually has
> > > implmented the feature, because there is no specific owner of
> > > code in open-source. To avoid arguments about money, I think it
> > > is best, if money is given to KDE e.V and we developers
> > > concentrate on having fun with programming.
> >
> > I think you're right, and if someone wants to pay something, it
> > is best send to KDE e.V. However, I still think that it would be
> > no problem if someone was paid to implement a certain feature
> > based on what's allready there. If, for the sake of argument, I
> > were to implement these recurring to-do items in KOrganizer,
> > making the asker of this feature very happy, why can't I receive
> > some money for that. I don't claim that any code is mine, nor do
> > I claim that I made everything needed for this feature myself. I
> > would merely have made sure that a certain feature was
> > implemented (and after that became available for the whole
> > community, as it should be). If someone would want to pay me to
> > do that, why not?
>
> I believe it's wrong for two reasons.
> Imagine somebody writes a lib and a small GUI for his lib and it
> took enourmous amount of time to figure out how to certain things
> inside the lib. Now somebody want's a button somewhere placed.
> One devel figures it's quite easy given the lib already supports
> that feature. He places the button via designer. He get's lets say
> 50$ for 5 minutes of work and the appreciation. Maybe a dot story
> is running about that new feature and devel X 'the Button placer'
> gets all the appreciation. This can lead to some problems inside
> the community if this pay for a feature policy gets wide spread.
> First of all the main author would get pissed because he get's only
> bugreports that the feature is not working correctly and he gets no
> appreciation for his work.
> This could lead to the situation that people are lurking for such
> offers and are implementing it over and over again.
> Other people invest hard work into everything and you lurk for the
> right situation to make some money.
> I believe that such a situation is entirely bad for the community
> cause this would lead to disputes and suspiciousness belong the
> developers. When the money get's donated to the KDE e.V. it's
> public available. The KDE e.V. distributes the money belong the
> developer that needs it. Or it's buying pretzels on fairs... ;)
>
> I hope that my arguments make sense
> regards Holger

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