Is this to do with your comfort level in understanding their approach?
> need to invest considerable time understanding the codebase you are working on and the problems your changes are solving before I can even begin to properly think about your changesets
Completely fair.
> during We Just Got New Budget So Let's Recruit All The People month.
Lol
> One might then go look at github repositories as well as scheduling longer meet-and-greets for the most interesting people to make the final selection.
I see, so using the activity and portfolio _after_ the fact as a means to gauge additional signal once the baseline has been met
> Moreover, many publishers don't accept direct applications, or only accept them during specific, brief, time periods - by requiring the author to get an agent to agree to represent them, they are effectively outsourcing that initial screening step)
Interesting, thanks for sharing!