

OSS Bounty project: todo list / collaborative outliner, to be open sourced - jacquesm
http://jacquesmattheij.com/Bounty+project%3A+todo+list+/+collaborative+outliner%2C+to+be+open+sourced

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evdawg
At the risk of leaving a 'negative' comment:

This is dangerously close (for lack of a better word) to spec work. You might
get paid, based on a vague specification (I want something like x.com!
Features? Just look at x.com!)

The author wants it all but offers very little. It HAS to be completed FAST
(first team gets the cash!), and it has to be polished ("This is not to be a
'botch' job, I want something that's production grade"). ANY HN'r should know
that FAST and POLISH do not go together.

To add insult to injury, you have to hand over all your copyright. Yeah right!

For the reasons above (low budget, no formal specifications, handing over all
copyright, and risk of not being paid whatsoever), I really think that if you
participate you ARE being taken advantage of.

~~~
jacquesm
Nobody said it would have to be done fast, but if there are multiple people
that will go and do this then there is a chance that if you move too slow that
you'll miss out. That is also why I thought it fair to offer the possibility
of listing those that plan on working on this so that people could collaborate
rather then compete. I thought it would be fair to mention that in case
someone thought they would be able to go and do this and come back in 12
months time. By then most likely someone will have solved it. But I don't
impose a time limit.

Polished as in: if you think that presenting a pile of junk tomorrow morning
is going to pass muster then no, that's not the intention.

The copyright is as far as the transaction is concerned the moment at which
payment takes place. I'm not paying this as a private individual, I'm paying
it through a corporation and if I want to make a payment there has to be
something on the the balance sheet to cover for that. Because the final
product is to be open sourced that should not matter, correct me if I am wrong
here why there is a practical reason why that is bad. Another good reason is
to make sure the code actually does get released under the GPL, and that there
will not be suddenly double licensing tricks or other nasty gotchas.

If you feel that you are or might being taken advantage of, then _please_ do
not do this, that's not the intention and that's definitely not where I want
to take this.

Rather the opposite, I have some money - not a whole lot - and a whole pile of
ideas that I would like to see come to life as open source projects. If you
feel that you do not want to get paid but you want to make this project come
to life as an open source offering then _of course_ that would be an even
bigger advantage to me, I figured that by offering a reasonable bounty on this
the chances of seeing it becoming a reality would increase.

I take it you are not interested ;)

If instead of just negative stuff you would like to contribute ways in which I
could make the offer better then I would be most grateful.

~~~
aristidb
I do not think his posting should be considered negative. It pointed out very
valid concerns.

One way you might make your offer more attractive without paying more or
compromising quality might be lifting the restriction to PHP 4.

~~~
falldowngoboom
PHP4 end of life was at the end of 2007. I don't think you'd lose many users
for requiring php5. (sorry couldn't reply to the correct nested comment)

~~~
jacquesm
That's a good argument, I thought it was still a supported version. Thank you,
I will amend the article.

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ivanstojic
I find this part objectionable:

When the job is completed and tested it will be open sourced, GPLV2, copyright
will be assigned to 'The Modular Company BV' in the Netherlands.

If this is GPLed, then it shouldn't matter much who holds the copyright. If
you want the copyright, then it's not much of a sign of your belief in open
source.

Ideally you'd accept MIT licensed code.

~~~
jacquesm
See above for an explanation of why the transfer of copyright was added, if
you have an alternative to that that will pass with my bookkeeper I'm open to
it.

As for MIT vs GPL, I chose the GPL because it is the license that I believe
best represents the spirit of what I want to achieve. If you wish you can make
a similar offer using the MIT license.

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rewind
Typically, someone wants work done, finds someone to do it, and they agree on
what's getting done and how much is going to be paid. In this case, 100% of
the risk is with the developer. Maybe someone else builds it first; maybe you
don't like what the finished product looks like; etc. There is no risk to you
here. It seems like a very one-sided approach to getting something done.

As an aside, doesn't this belong on a job board or contractor site?

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falldowngoboom
Are you opposed to a lightweight framework? Or a templating tool like Smarty?
Ideally, a good framework would make a cleaner, more coherent codebase. If you
restrict frameworks, I have a feeling most devs will just roll their own.

~~~
jacquesm
I think that plenty of people are going to 'drop' this in to their existing
site as a nice to have module in the back-office or intranet. That means
they'll have to do customization, any kind of dependency is going to make that
much harder.

So even a 'lightweight' framework will likely complicate things, for instance
it is possible that another framework is already present.

------
AlexMuir
And another great offer to the HN community!

This is the inverse of kickstarter. Is there a site where you can post these
sort of things?

~~~
flipbrad
I have been dreaming for a long time of a site where groups could form around
issues, put together a bounty, and administer it collaboratively. I think it
was tried once, called bigcarrot.com, and hasn't really taken off.

Sad to read at the bottom of the page that they have a patent pending on this.
How ridiculous.

~~~
jacquesm
You can't patent a business method. So they can stick 'patent pending' on
anything it just won't fly.

Also, I've been 'dreaming' along with you for a long long time, mail me
please, let's compare notes. I'm not quite ready to go publick with my dream
just yet, but if you read the list of ideas linked above you might find the
right one.

