On 10/11/06, ara.t.howard / noaa.gov <ara.t.howard / noaa.gov> wrote:

> i answer quite a few questions on comp.lang.ruby/ruby-talk for free.  lately
> quite a few people have started contacting me directly and offered to pay to
> get quick answers to questions.  so far i haven't taken anyone up on it.
>
> however, i'll mention here, for posterity, that i would prioritize any
> question/problem/bug emailed to me directly (while still cc'ing ruby-talk of
> any code) if the sender gave a donation, no matter how small, to rubycentral.
>
> i wonder if something more organized along these lines might work out:
>
>    rubycentral donation => quick ruby help

Wow ara, I really like this idea!  Perhaps a forum could be made in
which people pledge money for help, and those interested in helping
can see this.

It would be a true donation system though, so it's not like we'd
suggest how much people should donate or necessarily put more effort
in based on dollar amount.  And there will be no certain expectations
of quality, just that people would be willing to put high priority
towards these messages.  This might just be something where the users
of this list agree to read up on it regularly, or read it before going
through ruby-talk, or whatever makes sense to them individually.