4 ms·

I think FREE is the problem. Anything that is free will either find ways to make you pay for it or has other people pay for it. As a bonus you don't have any co

by 6510 7y ago

I think FREE is the problem. Anything that is free will either find ways to make you pay for it or has other people pay for it. As a bonus you don't have any complaints either since you officially didn't pay. Is Wikimedia acting in users best interest? It really doesn't need to beg for your money but it cant get enough of your money? haha I don't know what it costs to host 250 billion page views per year but they claim 40% is spend on hosting. They have 180 million to spend so hosting would be72 million? 1 dollar would buy 1400 page views? If you simply use a crappy service, say hostinger's 1 usd per month x 12 you get 1200 GB bandwidth. Average wiki articles are 3.6 kb. That is 27 million page views. 20 000 times 1400? I'm not an expert but I imagine hosting on that scale is much cheaper. It is acting in my interest 1:20000 which is certainly better than selling my personal information to creepy faceless money men. I would much rather buy access to 250 GB worth of wiki articles for 1 euro but no one figured out the payment model. Brave does seem lovely until you see them solicit funds in other peoples name without permission. It much seems like [say] collecting funds for Greenpeace but hey! I keep an administrative chunk for myself. The puzzle is unsolved. Good luck

deleted 7y ago
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Ayesh 7y ago
I think LetsEncrypt (ISRG) is one of the best examples when it comes to donations. They have a super small budget and a very small staff, but they single handedly made pretty much every web site today encrypted. One billion certificates issued so far, and the rate if it is only going up. If you have a budget to make some donations, please out LE on the top of the list. They are doing a wonderful job and you are will make a massive change.
onyva 7y ago
Free is NOT the problem. Free is the “business model” of the internet. Just because some people want to monetize it doesn’t mean we need to give up and just let them do what they want. Selling ads is not the purpose of the internet. Content created to sell ads is most of the time garbage. No chicken, no egg no puzzle to resolve.
- 6510 7y ago
  I don't think the purpose of the internet is set in stone. It is an ongoing experiment, we are evolving the square peg to fit in the round hole. (haha) I like the "asking the right questions" thing a lot. I'm never quite happy with the question, the way I've put it certainly leaves a lot of room for improvement. My formula is something like: First blow up the "problem" way out of proportion (summarize all parts that are wrong with something) then remove the most unreasonable arguments. I do lots of things for free both online and offline. Its a gift really, I put in the effort, the time and the money. (I wouldn't call it a business model tho) The problem with this is that I can only do so much. With free software for example people have a drive to make something that works. We get a huge amount of great stuff but with rare exception the end results don't get polished. There is always a lack of effort with boring shit that would add a lot to a project. (I always feel terrible when looking back at the state I abandoned a project in.) Say you have a product to sell, you have to find ways to find customers. The same goes for gifting free things (like software) So, uhhh... where is the free marketing? Users expect the product to find them FOR FREE! but this simply doesn't work. If we paid some incredibly small amount to be found by products that are interesting to us we would be far less reluctant to provide the necessary personal details. I own 3 guitars that I never play. There are lots of products that fit that profile. If such a product finder was tied in with say 100 other subscriptions and my ISP billed me for those services it would be something incredibly cheap and worth buying. In stead google charges stores an arm and a leg to chase me with wimmens panties because my deceased mum ordered those 15 year ago. WTF?? People wrote fantastic free software that would have been even better if enough users could find it. Meanwhile the commercial alternative is rubbed in peoples face all day long. I would like to see the "build it and they will come" model work. Adsense makes a hundred billion in revenue because free doesn't work. This is the puzzle. If you can figure out how to do it for free ill give you 5 internet stars and a standing ovation. Ill be pondering how to do it on the cheap. Call me unambitious ;)
- jfengel 7y ago
  Most content is garbage, but there exists content you want. If it didn't exist, you wouldn't be looking for it, and you wouldn't see any ads. Ads are just the most friction-free way (from the reader's point of view) to pay for it. You don't have to install anything or connect your bank account. There's a lot wrong with that, including the proliferation of crappy content, but it does fund a lot of the genuine content as well. Both readers and writers want a better way, but results are mixed at best.

by 6510 7y ago

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

Ayesh 7y ago

I think LetsEncrypt (ISRG) is one of the best examples when it comes to donations. They have a super small budget and a very small staff, but they single handedly made pretty much every web site today encrypted. One billion certificates issued so far, and the rate if it is only going up. If you have a budget to make some donations, please out LE on the top of the list. They are doing a wonderful job and you are will make a massive change.

onyva 7y ago

Free is NOT the problem. Free is the “business model” of the internet. Just because some people want to monetize it doesn’t mean we need to give up and just let them do what they want. Selling ads is not the purpose of the internet. Content created to sell ads is most of the time garbage. No chicken, no egg no puzzle to resolve.

6510 7y ago
I don't think the purpose of the internet is set in stone. It is an ongoing experiment, we are evolving the square peg to fit in the round hole. (haha) I like the "asking the right questions" thing a lot. I'm never quite happy with the question, the way I've put it certainly leaves a lot of room for improvement. My formula is something like: First blow up the "problem" way out of proportion (summarize all parts that are wrong with something) then remove the most unreasonable arguments. I do lots of things for free both online and offline. Its a gift really, I put in the effort, the time and the money. (I wouldn't call it a business model tho) The problem with this is that I can only do so much. With free software for example people have a drive to make something that works. We get a huge amount of great stuff but with rare exception the end results don't get polished. There is always a lack of effort with boring shit that would add a lot to a project. (I always feel terrible when looking back at the state I abandoned a project in.) Say you have a product to sell, you have to find ways to find customers. The same goes for gifting free things (like software) So, uhhh... where is the free marketing? Users expect the product to find them FOR FREE! but this simply doesn't work. If we paid some incredibly small amount to be found by products that are interesting to us we would be far less reluctant to provide the necessary personal details. I own 3 guitars that I never play. There are lots of products that fit that profile. If such a product finder was tied in with say 100 other subscriptions and my ISP billed me for those services it would be something incredibly cheap and worth buying. In stead google charges stores an arm and a leg to chase me with wimmens panties because my deceased mum ordered those 15 year ago. WTF?? People wrote fantastic free software that would have been even better if enough users could find it. Meanwhile the commercial alternative is rubbed in peoples face all day long. I would like to see the "build it and they will come" model work. Adsense makes a hundred billion in revenue because free doesn't work. This is the puzzle. If you can figure out how to do it for free ill give you 5 internet stars and a standing ovation. Ill be pondering how to do it on the cheap. Call me unambitious ;)
jfengel 7y ago
Most content is garbage, but there exists content you want. If it didn't exist, you wouldn't be looking for it, and you wouldn't see any ads. Ads are just the most friction-free way (from the reader's point of view) to pay for it. You don't have to install anything or connect your bank account. There's a lot wrong with that, including the proliferation of crappy content, but it does fund a lot of the genuine content as well. Both readers and writers want a better way, but results are mixed at best.