“Bang for the buck” is `NaN` in most cases due to denominator sadness.
I know it’s just a turn of phrase, but any talk of things like “optimal use of dev resources” and whatnot is just corporate mindset being inappropriately applied to FOSS.
Discussion
I think I disagree about this mindset being inappropriately applied to FOSS. Scarcity is a natural reality that cannot be ignored regardless of context. At every level, we’re wired to think about risk/reward, bang/buck, time preference. FOSS should aim to foster enthusiasm from contributors, of course. At the same time, the most successful FOSS projects have a centralized “plan” of some kind that defines what they want the outcomes to look like, and maintainers decide which initiatives to prioritize and when. The NIPs embody this to some extent.
I agree. I mean more that outside of the lead maintainers and the vision/focus they bring, it’s a little hopeless to try to drive the direction/attention of developers.
In 2019 Stepan Snigirev was solely focused on Specter Desktop as a QR-based wallet coordinator. USB hardware wallet support was nowhere near the top of his roadmap (maybe not even on it). But I really wanted to be able to use Specter w/my usb wallets. So I just did my own thing and PRed support for them in. That ended up helping propel Specter Desktop into prominence in the early days before Sparrow came about.
If Stepan (being the lead maintainer) had said that he definitively did NOT want usb hww support, I would’ve dropped the idea.
But if anyone else had said, “Meh, I’m happy with Specter as being QR-only; you’re wasting your time,” I would have disregarded them and built it anyway.