Top Talent for Free

[Jason C. Wells]

Something occured to me recently when I was listening the the Mormon 
Tabernacle Choir sing Handel's Messiah the other day.  There is no 
shortage of top talent willing to perform some tasks for free.  In this 
particular case, one could argue that some of the very best in the world 
are singing for free.  Many musicians work for free in well established 
orchestras, for example in Seattle where I paid money to hear Messiah.

It seems like the same is true for open source.  There are some very 
clever people right here in the FreeBSD community.  Some are more widely 
known (jkh, Watson, McKusick) than others but all of them are very 
good.  Some open source developers have turned their open source 
involvement into a lucrative gig.  But many remain volunteers.

Then you have situations like football here in the US or even football 
as you call it everywhere else.  There is no shortage of top talent in 
these sports.   These people command sizable incomes in this effort though.

So what's the difference?  How do some fields of endeavor get top talent 
for free and other fields of endeavor pay big bucks for the top talent?  
Certainly we could find footballers to play on TV for free.

Later,
Jason