The example he gives is completely unrelated to the real world. Asking a group of people to complete tasks they are not professionals at completing is very different from asking a skilled person to complete a task he is a professional at completing. If this idea of incentivizing is so good try to get a house painter to paint your house for the reward of a job well done. In addition some of the q and a sites that are run for major corporations that need difficult questions answered have rewards over $10,000. I have a strong feeling these questions would never be answered for a pat on the back. Do you think netflix reward for improving their recommendation engine was fruitless? I will agree that your post sounds like "a bunch of communist hippie bullcrap"