3 ms·

I agree with the sentiment that shady things shouldn't be excused because "I'm an open source developer and I need money". You have a point there. Although: >

by cj 7y ago

I agree with the sentiment that shady things shouldn't be excused because "I'm an open source developer and I need money". You have a point there. Although: > decides to embed advertising such as "Try LINODE for 30 days!" in "README.md" Are you trying to say that this is also not acceptable? Our company sponsors a few open source npm projects, and all of the projects we sponsor have our logo in the README.md - is that really not socially acceptable?

jasode 7y ago
>we sponsor have our logo in the README.md - is that really not socially acceptable? In the d3 example I tried to exaggerate the hypothetical intrusiveness of ads by embedding it in all the js source files. In your specific case, if nobody is complaining about your ad inside of a single "README.md", I'm going to presume it's "acceptable".
Hamuko 7y ago
There is a difference between a company logo and "Try Company PRODUCT for 30 days!" I imagine the latter comes with a link, perhaps even a tracking one, to sign up for the service.
- lolinder 7y ago
  Not OP, but I still think that's acceptable. README.md is one of a very small number of places that open source developers can reach their users. Most of the time I only read it once, so if there's an ad there, or a link to their other products, as long as it's not a GIF and they didn't find some way to embed a tracker in README.md, I'm cool with it. It's about as relevant as advertising gets, and it's not coming from a pool of clickbait ads. It's a developer using their open source work to generate interest in the work that pays for it.
  - kelnos 7y ago
    As an open source developer, I would refuse to "reach" my users in such a tacky way as selling ad space in my README. You're correct that the README is one of the few touch points with users, and I wouldn't dare waste that on something I consider so disrespectful.
    - lolinder 7y ago
      Oh, I'm not talking about selling ad space. I agree that what Funded did was misguided at best. But what my parent was responding to was the idea of even putting a little ad for a paid product by the same developer or company. If JetBrains, for example, wanted to remind me on the README for Kotlin that they have an IDE that works well with the language, that doesn't offend me.
- Fnoord 7y ago
  An affiliate link, I suppose. Which is annoying, as these are practically spam.
- marcosdumay 7y ago
  > perhaps even a tracking one Tracking the campaign? Yes, probably. But tracking you? How do you expect that to work? Making ads contextual to the place they are and tracking the campaigns to discover what works and what doesn't is how it should be done.
  - Ensorceled 7y ago
    I presume the user is assuming you could put a tracking pixel in the readme and have it rendered, the same way the build badges work. Github is, of course, one step ahead and hides those behind camo.githubusercontent.com.
Avamander 7y ago
> Are you trying to say that this is also not acceptable? Not OP but I think it's acceptable. I'm happy to see my favourite free (as in freedom) projects' developers being supported. If someone doesn't like it and if it's truly free software then anyone can fork it to remove that ad and we don't have a problem. That's how free software works, if you can't, then it's not free software. If one just won't fork and opposes what a free software project does then that's just entitlement.

by cj 7y ago

jasode 7y ago

>we sponsor have our logo in the README.md - is that really not socially acceptable? In the d3 example I tried to exaggerate the hypothetical intrusiveness of ads by embedding it in all the js source files. In your specific case, if nobody is complaining about your ad inside of a single "README.md", I'm going to presume it's "acceptable".

Hamuko 7y ago

There is a difference between a company logo and "Try Company PRODUCT for 30 days!" I imagine the latter comes with a link, perhaps even a tracking one, to sign up for the service.

lolinder 7y ago
Not OP, but I still think that's acceptable. README.md is one of a very small number of places that open source developers can reach their users. Most of the time I only read it once, so if there's an ad there, or a link to their other products, as long as it's not a GIF and they didn't find some way to embed a tracker in README.md, I'm cool with it. It's about as relevant as advertising gets, and it's not coming from a pool of clickbait ads. It's a developer using their open source work to generate interest in the work that pays for it.
- kelnos 7y ago
  As an open source developer, I would refuse to "reach" my users in such a tacky way as selling ad space in my README. You're correct that the README is one of the few touch points with users, and I wouldn't dare waste that on something I consider so disrespectful.
  - lolinder 7y ago
    Oh, I'm not talking about selling ad space. I agree that what Funded did was misguided at best. But what my parent was responding to was the idea of even putting a little ad for a paid product by the same developer or company. If JetBrains, for example, wanted to remind me on the README for Kotlin that they have an IDE that works well with the language, that doesn't offend me.
Fnoord 7y ago
An affiliate link, I suppose. Which is annoying, as these are practically spam.
marcosdumay 7y ago
> perhaps even a tracking one Tracking the campaign? Yes, probably. But tracking you? How do you expect that to work? Making ads contextual to the place they are and tracking the campaigns to discover what works and what doesn't is how it should be done.
- Ensorceled 7y ago
  I presume the user is assuming you could put a tracking pixel in the readme and have it rendered, the same way the build badges work. Github is, of course, one step ahead and hides those behind camo.githubusercontent.com.

Avamander 7y ago

> Are you trying to say that this is also not acceptable? Not OP but I think it's acceptable. I'm happy to see my favourite free (as in freedom) projects' developers being supported. If someone doesn't like it and if it's truly free software then anyone can fork it to remove that ad and we don't have a problem. That's how free software works, if you can't, then it's not free software. If one just won't fork and opposes what a free software project does then that's just entitlement.