You're right that users will ask the impossible, and accept the unacceptable, but I think that a good enough feedback mechanism could over-come this, and sites such as Stackoverflow have implemented feedback mechanisms that could work.
Eg. by allowing comments on answers, the glaring security hold in the ZIP-code form answer could be raised, addressed, and fixed.
Allow moderators to say 'this task is too big/the bounty is too small', while simultaneously limiting the maximum bounty to something small.
IMO, the 'right' solution is for libraries to be more easily broken in to pieces while simultaneously easier to use together so that just the form part of the 'big ZIP-code PHP library' could be used in this case, but barring that, this is a neat attempt at code-by-documentation, given that most of the problems I saw were easier than homework problems.
> but I think that a good enough feedback mechanism could over-come this, and sites such as Stackoverflow have implemented feedback mechanisms that could work
But people are on SO out of a desire to help other people, and SO specifically encourages general problems - so saying "that's not possible" is the right answer to the syllables problem instead of some messy thrown together code that doesn't actually work.
By introducing the financial reward system, this goes out the window. I get nothing out of commenting on bounties, explaining why answers are wrong or requests impossible because I'm not contributing to a community of being helpful to future people running into a problem.
> IMO, the 'right' solution is for libraries to be more easily broken in to pieces while simultaneously easier to use together
Sounds good, but that's not how software development works. The cognitive skills required to break down a problem into such pieces is significantly higher that those required to write code that performs the task.
The system could easily pay a pittance for commenting, and then more for distinguished answer; and hell, a monetary penalty for poor answers/spam.
Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seemed like the accepted answer, along with its code, was freely available, so future people do get the benefit of your insight.
> The cognitive skills required to break down a problem into such pieces is significantly higher
...so why should they waste their valuable time doing both the documentation and implementation?
I like the idea of being able to nitpick someone's code for credits. I also like the idea of being able to take [some of] their $ if I can prove their method is wrong within a certain amount of time of being accepted, or possibly all of the $ if they really screwed the pooch.
Eg. by allowing comments on answers, the glaring security hold in the ZIP-code form answer could be raised, addressed, and fixed.
Allow moderators to say 'this task is too big/the bounty is too small', while simultaneously limiting the maximum bounty to something small.
IMO, the 'right' solution is for libraries to be more easily broken in to pieces while simultaneously easier to use together so that just the form part of the 'big ZIP-code PHP library' could be used in this case, but barring that, this is a neat attempt at code-by-documentation, given that most of the problems I saw were easier than homework problems.