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Comment by jaredklewis | Hacker News Reader

It is a reasonable desire, but not one very likely to be fulfilled.

Let's say I pick up some trash at the local park. Plenty of positive externalities there.

But if I then send the community a bill afterwards, I don't think it will go over very well. Even if they all appreciate the effort they might object, on any number of grounds:

- There are other trash pickers who are more efficient and can be hired more cheaply.

- There are other higher priority projects to which those funds should be allocated.

- That the quality of the trash picking was not in line with the bill.

- And on and on.

If I want to get paid for picking up trash I'll have to work it out with the community before hand. And then there will be expectations, contracts, a supervisor, and all those things that come with jobs.

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There is a lot to be said for the value society receives for paying a 10 cent bounty to pick up cans/bottles. How to implement a similar universal petty payment system for FOSS contributions is beyond me, but a minimal overhead method to funnel subsistence-level money to contributors feels like it would have net-positive societal benefits.

While not the reason for "Pfand" in Germany (originally it's to encourage reuse of bottles, now it's expanded to include recycling), this is a pretty good analogy. Including the points beyond which it fails: You get emptied trash cans because people tried to get at the Pfand... Which brings you back to the original point: People are far better at gaming a system than the system is at setting its rules

But if the community reacts like this then you didn't really solve a problem for them. At least they didn't see it this way.

Perhaps a more apt analogy: you invent a better water filtering system and provide it to the world for free.

The community immediately starts using it as the benefits are undeniable, but now the community needs someone to do maintenance on their new filter system and you are the only one with the required expertise.

Should they "sponsor" you or is it fair of them to expect you to provide them support for free?

I don't necessarily think it is fair, but my guess is that even in your example, the inventor is unlikely to get paid very much by the community unless they had a maintenance agreement worked out in advance. They might be able to get some funding through something like the Nobel prize or Gates foundation.

Like the author of the article, I've observed that if you give a gift, it's very hard to charge for it after it’s been accepted. Whether this is innate to human psychology or caused by social constructs, I don't know, but it basically feels like a law of the universe.

But if there was already an established budget and way to decide how much the trash collection ought to be compensated there's no good reason why you shouldn't be. There probably needs to be a set contract between the community and "whoever wants to pick trash" up front though.

And some sort of new tax on everyone who uses FOSS, of course. Budgets don't appear out of nowhere.

Right, but that last part of your statement is the required piece that changes everything. An agreement in advance that when you do something you’re gonna get money for it.

“Positive externalities” are irrelevant.

A few years ago my housemate found out I was cleaning up trash around town and replied (with some disgust, I might add), "But we pay people for that!", to which I replied, "You mean the town owes me money? ;)"

What an excellent answer.

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