Bribe developers to fix bugs | Hacker News Reader

Bribe developers to fix bugs

bribe.io

We are creating Bribe.io for Startup Weekend. It is a service which allows users to pay developers to prioritize bugs that need fixing. We'd like to get feedback from users and developers who would use this new service. Please check out Bribe.io and fill out our survey.

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http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1995-11-13/

Wally: "i am going to write myself a new minvan this afternoon"

We envision that many times the bugs will be fixed by someone who has not already been working on that Open Source project. We also do not expect any projects which are intentionally buggy to become popular enough to make a difference.

Bribe.io will also include work on enhancements to an existing Open Source project.

An open-source environment is really the only place this kind of motivation could work. As you say, if the project is intentionally buggy, it's unlikely to be used.

Love the idea!

Some of my colleagues wrote a research paper about a system like this a few years back:

http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/files/us-bacon/B...

They proposed a new notion of "software correctness" as an equilibrium in which there is insufficient economic demand for any further bug fixes. Cool to see such a system being built!

I was considering starting a kickstarter like site for this as well. Some projects have stalled development. It would be interesting to have a system where people can create a road plan for a particular stalled open source project, and donate to the development. Once a given target is reached, developers can bid on the project, compleat it, and get paid.

There are some projects, like DoubleCommander, which I would pay money to make it move faster, as it's the only viable TotalCommander clone for MAC. However, I can't afford to hire anyone to work on it by my self, and can't expect the primary developer to work on it for free any harder than he already is.

Aka, extort users to pay for bug fixes :)

Yes, because requesting to be paid for doing work is a programmers ultimate sin..

Nothing wrong with it though it seems wrong to lead people into thinking something is free or letting them become depending on it.

We hope that the vast majority of users will not exploit users. There are also many businesses which rely on open source software but there is no system for them to find and pay capable developers to fix bugs or implement new features they need.

One area we have discussed is Wordpress plugins. There are thousands of users using various plugins which may need some updates. They need to be updated as web browsers change and perhaps someone really likes a Wordpress theme but it has not been adapted to work on mobile. This scenario would be a good for Bribe.io which would help lots of people.

We will allow multiple people to join in on a bribe to up the amount to recruit developers to work on the job. So if there are 10 Wordpress users which all put in $10 it may be enough to give a developer the incentive to spend time to take on the challenge.

Yep, definitely sounds like an appropriate use case. I was just poking a little fun at the possibility of it being used to exploit users.

Not extort, just incentivize developers for them.

It's a lot more friendly and fun!

For a side project I wanted to experiment with a very similar idea.

Due to other commitments I was not able to give the project the love it deserved. Perhaps some of the code or concepts will be useful for you guys:

https://github.com/codebounty/codebounty codebounty.co

Let me know if I can help. @jon_perl

This is different from https://www.bountysource.com/ how?

We have been looking at Bounty Source which has many similar ideas. It is tied into GitHub while Bribe.io will work with any source repository or issue tracker. Bribe.io may also work with smaller tasks while Bounty Source looks like it is taking on very large projects.

Was just about to mention this site. I'd also be interested in knowing on what points it will differ from it, assuming the founders of bribe.io know about the already-available alternative.

We have been looking at Bounty Source. We think jobs on Bribe.io will not be on that scale. Some of those projects are quite involved while Bribe.io may be smaller efforts, like updating a WordPress plugin to be responsive for mobile so it works with a mobile theme. It may just take an hour and earn the developer $100.

There may be some crossover with Bounty Source which could be good to provide multiple resources for users and developers.

I see. Thanks for the quick reply!

bribes, or bounties, or prizes, or whatever you want to call it work on the extrinsic motivations for people to act. In many cases, open source projects are a product of love, that is, intrinsic motivations. There's always a risk when introducing extrinsic motivations that they'll crowd out the intrinsic.

I see where you are coming from, but I find that for myself, I come to different conclusions.

I work on open source not just because I love my product, but due to an element of wanting to show off. It's kind of a badge of honor, a point of pride to have a project that people use and love.

Which is to say that, without the motivation of others using my project, wanting to contribute to it, and even wanting to donate money to the project, my personal level of interest declines ("nobody is using this anyway.")

Human motivation is complicated. Chances are that ones relationship to some kind of labour is mixed with both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations: implementing the back end might be fun for you, while the front end is tedious, or vice versa. Or maybe it was only fun to make 90% of the features, while polishing those features and delivering the last 10% is a lot of tedium. Things like this might help to make some open source products more well-rounded.

I like the idea. But bribe has a negative feel to it. Why not bounty?

Because that's already been done! https://www.bountysource.com/

I joined the project and made the same suggestion. Brad likes calling it Bribe so we are going with. It may make it more interesting and get more attention this way.

The bottom line is we want this to be a system that helps people. I've been at the mercy of open source projects which don't stay on top of known bugs which I am not always able to fix myself. I personally would love to task someone who is better prepared to take on the work to take on the job and I can focus on what I do best.

I think it's negative in a playful way, and as a result, positive.

This is amazing idea, but I'm wondering that how is transaction going to work? Will there be any amount of money that "staff" keep?

The way we are going to handle the money is to take the payment when someone creates a job. The money will be held in an escrow account. Then developers can work on the job and submit their solution. Once the user accepts the work by the developer the money from the escrow account will be released to the developer. There will be a fee for the user while the developer gets the full amount pledged.

If there is a conflict we can step in to resolve it and make a decision. Since the money is in the escrow account it will not be possible for the user to just not pay and the developer cannot just take the money and run before they user accepts the solution.

Since you are taking money from the user, it is your incentive always to decide in their favor in order to get their repeat business.

Nice idea. I think it's extra interesting since I remember reading a debate here on HN about "bribing" OSS developers.

Got a link for that debate? The name is meant to get some attention while it is our intention to help users find developers who can help them make updates to the software they use but cannot update themselves.

And the developers getting paid to make these updates may be college undergrads or someone who has a day job but dedicates sometime to working on the jobs set up on Bribe.io. They can make some money helping others while also contributing to OSS which helps everyone.

Not just bugs, but adding features too!

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