I'd build his/her CRUD app, and make sure it wasn't shitty, if I felt it had potential to be a useful product and also felt like the people I met would be good to work with/for.

I've learned the hard way that I much prefer quality of life over "sexy dev work." (...and obviously take both if I can find it.)

Ouch. So, I'm not in the software business, but either way the point of my Q&A is measure the distance between what an employee wants to during the day versus what probably needs to be done to accomplish the desired result. When the gap is big the hire/job never works out.

I might not want your shitty CRUD app to exist per se, but the building of it might not be half bad, and I might learn something useful on the way and maybe even make some new friends.

It's not unreasonable to look for a job where some of it is what you'd do for free, if you didn't need the money.

Yes, I would. Probably not for 40 hours a week, but I would.