If I were 16, I’d be thinking I just made an obscene amount of money ($4,000!) messing with computers for fun, and got to meet people at a famous company.
That’s a free car. Free computer. Uber eats for months.
And my status with my peers as a hacker would be cemented.
I get that bounty amounts are low vs SE salary, but that’s not at all how my 16yo self would see it.
When I was sixteen I was already familiar with the concept of leverage. I’m not sure if I’d have had the cajones to use it though.