Hacktoberfest just changed its rules

Dear contributors,
in case you are wondering why your pull-requests show 14 days maturity while the faqs & rules tell you otherwise:

The github repo of hacktoberfest digitalocean/hacktoberfest gives us more info.

Until (PR-605)[https://github.com/digitalocean/hacktoberfest/pull/605] is approved, many of us might be in teh dark about the rule-change.
While I do understand that spam is an issue, I personally don't like the fact that rules change during this event. What do you think?

Comments

[neoan]

You can just keep on submitting. Just because you already qualified does not mean you have to stop. Your PRs will show up in your profile as well. From the perspective of Hacktoberfest, it just means you are done and can wait for the maturity period to be over.

[neoan]

Yes, that's what they mean. However, I am a little concerned about the fact that when the rule change happened, my former commits started the new maturity period then, resulting in a total maturity time of 16 instead of 14 days. So let's hope everything works reliably.

[Andre Vasconcelos]

I welcome this change, though it should have been made much sooner.

I always found it odd that the rules could be so easily abused in the past, I guess this has always been a ticking time bomb

[neoan]

Right. I don't dislike the content of the new rules rather the fact that they change them already "in the race" and fail to communicate that change effectively.

[Andre Vasconcelos]

Definitely agree on that

[Janne Kujanpää]

Thanks for information. Warning incoming rant!

Digital ocean's communication and behavior are unacceptable.

I joined today, did my PRs and rules/FAQ does not state anything about hacktoberfest topic. In the hidden post: hacktoberfest.digitalocean.com/hac... they are telling

We will honor all valid pull requests prior to this change, and as of October 3, 2020 at 12:00:00 UTC – and October 3 in all time zones – pull requests will only count toward earning a T-shirt or planting a tree if they are submitted in a repository classified with the ‘hacktoberfest’ topic.

Therefore rules and FAQ is just a lie. I would trust my money or business to be handled such a company.

[neoan]

Well, I somewhat agree but also realize that the Hacktoberfest page itself is OS. So in a weird way it nicely shows the hurdles of a community changing a running system.

[Nicolas Frankel]

it's rules

its rules

[neoan]

Jep! You are right

[Theofanis Despoudis]

As always it's because people trying to game the system that we end up with what we have. Sad.

[neoan]

From what I hear this was a problem in previous years as well. There was and is a lot of discussion around it. I guess the question is also how to make sure the reputation of event in general doesn't suffer.