Open-source bounty explained

An open-source bounty is a monetary reward for completing a task in an open-source software project.

Description

Bounties are usually offered as an incentive for fixing software bugs or implementing minor features.^[1] Bounty driven development is one of the business models for open-source software. The compensation offered for an open-source bounty is usually small.^[2]

Examples of bounties

• 2023: The Prettier Challenge^[3] to write a Rust program that would pass 95% of Prettier test suite was completed within 3 weeks and awarded $22,500 to Biome contributors.^[4]
• 2018: Mozilla Firefox's WebRTC (Web Real-Time Communications) bug was submitted by Education First to Bountysource for $50,000.^[5]
• Sun MicroSystems (now owned by Oracle Corporation) has offered $1 million in bounties for OpenSolaris, NetBeans, OpenSPARC, GlassFish, OpenOffice.org, and OpenJDK.^[6]
• 2004: Mozilla introduced a Security Bug Bounty Program, offering $500 to anyone who finds a "critical" security bug in Mozilla.^[7]
• 2015: Artifex Software offers^[8] up to $1000 to anyone who fixes some of the issues posted on Ghostscript Bugzilla.
• Two software bounties were completed for the Amiga AROS operating system, producing a free Kickstart ROM replacement for use with the UAE emulator and FPGA Amiga reimplementations, as well as original Amiga hardware.^{[9] [10]}
• RISC OS Open bounty scheme to encourage development of RISC OS^[11]
• AmiZilla was an over $11,000 bounty to port the Firefox web-browser to AmigaOS, MorphOS & AROS. While the bounty produced little results it inspired many bounty systems in the Amiga community including Timberwolf, Power2people, AROS Bounties, Amigabounty.net and many more.

See also

• Bountysource
• Bug bounty program
• Business models for open-source software
• Crowdfunding
• Google Summer of Code

Notes and References

1. Towards understanding an open-source bounty: Analysis of bountysource . Kanda . T. . Guo . M. . Hata . H. . Matsumoto . K. . 2017 . 2017 IEEE 24th International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering (SANER) . 577–578 . IEEE.
2. Studying backers and hunters in bounty issue addressing process of open source projects . Zhou . J. . Wang . S. . Zhang . H. . Chen . T.H.P. . Hassan . A.E. . 2021 . . 26 . 4 . 1–36 . Springer. 10.1007/s10664-021-09979-z . 254472802 .
3. Web site: The Prettier Challenge. Algora, Public Benefit Corporation. 11 February 2024.
4. Web site: Biome formatter wins the Prettier challenge. Biome. 11 February 2024.
5. Web site: 2019-10-08 . Bountysource, Education First increase Mozilla WebRTC bounty to a whopping $50,000! . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20191008103829/https://blog.canya.com/2018/05/03/bountysource-education-first-increase-mozilla-webrtc-bounty-to-a-whopping-50000/ . 2019-10-08 . 2024-01-21 . CanYa Blog.
6. News: Sun sets $1 million open source bounty . iTnews.com.au . . Shaun Nichols . 30 January 2008 . 11 June 2022.
7. Web site: Brief: Mozilla offers bounty for bugs . Linda Rosencrance . . 3 August 2004 . 11 June 2022.
8. Web site: Ghostscript: Bug bounty program. 14 July 2015.
9. Web site: Amiga.org - Kickstart ROM Replacement (Phase II) Assigned. 14 July 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20101206191839/http://www.amiga.org/forums/printthread.php?t=55226. 6 December 2010. dead.
10. Web site: Kickstart ROM Replacement (Phase II). 14 July 2015.
11. Web site: RISC OS Open: All bounties. 14 July 2015.