How to fix a bug in an open-source project

It's funny to read that "Feross is awesome" and that "open-source folks love to get pull requests from newcomers". I actually submitted a humble pull request to a small library mantained by Feross, and he wasn't friendly: https://github.com/feross/run-series/pull/3

I can see and understand why he didn't want my PR merged, and I know it wasn't bugfix, but I think the fear of first-timers is justified and shouldn't be dismissed (I don't know if the post is only about bugfixes, but fixing bugs is not the most amazing thing, even worse if you are unfamiliar with the project). Worse, the problem of not being able to get your PRs accepted into open-source libraries causes either:

1. a lot of forks, all unmantained, each adding a different specific feature;

2. no forks at all, because the PR submitted knows he will not be able to maintain the project alone from that time on, if his fork breaks too much from the base and can't get its updates.

I don't know what would be the solution to this. Perhaps it is project mantainers actively signaling they want contributions from new people. Definitely it is not saying: "it's open source, fork it" for everybody that suggests a new feature.

Also, I don't think it is anyone's fault, but it is definitely a problem.

> First off: don’t panic!

Good post and read.