[koolba]

The open source version of this has existed for decades as well.

There’s the doers that actually enjoy the craft, want to share what they’ve done, and contribute to things they genuinely find intellectually stimulating.

And for each of those true believers there’s many more fly by night wannabes that think it’s some kind of shortcut to social validation.

[harimau777]

I think that a lot of that may come from the degree to which "contribute to an open source project" has been the advice for almost any job search problem. If people who are just looking for a job have to contribute to open source, then there's to be a lot of people who aren't passionate but have to do it.

[FinnLobsien]

I guess this is a general problem where things that show you take initiative get converted into “thing to put on your resume”, and if that’s the primary motivation, you’ll do the bare minimum to check the box to put it on your resume.

Same thing happens to school extracurriculars.