[ndl]

"Unfortunately, I don't have time to learn this system and work my way through your review process. I think I'll have to buy [insert (possibly proprietary) alternative] for now. Best of luck with the project."

For the record, I have written a couple patches and released open source code before. I say this after years of trying to convince all my friends to switch to Linux, and finally coming to terms with the fact that even I still have to keep a Windows boot for certain occasions.

[rbanffy]

As long as you are happy with the [insert (possibly proprietary) alternative] solution, I'm happy too.

Would you consider paying up to what [insert (possibly proprietary) alternative] costs for someone to write the patch for you? Would you consider gathering more people so you can fund your patch?

[ndl]

For paying a bounty, yes, assuming it can be arranged in a timely fashion.

For the latter, probably not. Assuming that for whatever reason I cannot write the patch myself, I do not have the time to start a new organization every time I encounter a new bug in some project. And I would guess that most ordinary consumers don't either.

This is not supposed to be a necessarily snarky response. Sometimes, an open source project exists, and it's not for everyone. The people behind the project should realize that every feature they choose not to include cause the software's value proposition to cease to exist for some users. It is up to them what to prioritize, and up to me whether using their software is worth the time of getting a patch committed.

Of course, my operating assumption here is that they want to hear about bugs/feature requests, and so it is worth something to them that I would bring it up in the 1st place. But I rarely ever make new feature requests. Usually this is in response to an evangelist telling me that I should switch to their platform, and my responding that it does not replace a current proprietary solution.