Of course, all developers and contributors who, in a positive way, added to BTC puzzle-solving approaches deserve donations. That is without any doubts or questions. I actually would consider it something obvious and completely normal that the one who solves the puzzle would donate some BTC also to other people, but I understand people are of various natures and kinds.

Anyway, if this is mainly about BTC puzzle solving, one would expect that the best candidate who would actually deserve a donation from the puzzle creator is the person who initially solved #66, as he was able to fulfill the original purpose for which the BTC puzzle was created in the first place but was robbed through RBF during price cash-out by a bot run by a thief, who, instead of being at least silent, keeping his mouth shut, and giving minimum half BTC back to the original #66 solver, was so insolent that he even dared to mock this person with some, only according to his head, kind of wannabe-wise messages left in BTC addresses. Primitive psychopath.

Yes, that RBF act was theft. There is no doubt, morally as well as legally.

Taking price from BTC puzzle upon finding the right solution based on skills and effort is completely legal, as that is what the puzzle was created for, and it is done with the well-informed consent of the puzzle creator, owner of BTC stored in puzzle addresses, but using RBF to replace outgoing mempool transaction during the cashing-out of BTC puzzle price is robbery. You can try to justify it and paint it as pink in whatever ways you want. It is a criminal act, nothing else.

The fact that the original #66 solver made the mistake of going through the public mempool doesn’t change a thing about it.