I do not, for a second, believe most maintainers would take money in exchange for being forced to follow good best practices in coding, testing, releasing, etc

I do not, for a second, believe most maintainers would take money in exchange for being forced to follow good best practices in coding, testing, releasing, etc Some would, but most are believing they would get paid for a hobby. Nobody is going to pay for a hobby, in part because it won't solve anything if they did Once they are paid to be real suppliers, they will not enjoy it at all. The vast majority of people who have ever tried to turn their hobby into a profession will tell you the same thing - if you want to ruin a hobby, add customers, standards, money, and deadlines. While, like I said, some will be fine with this, to me the money thing is overall a huge red herring.