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I had a similar idea for financing Open Source software projects. The contributing sponsors would get their URL and add-text into a comment at the top of the so

I had a similar idea for financing Open Source software projects. The contributing sponsors would get their URL and add-text into a comment at the top of the source-code. The bigger your sponsorship the higher up in the list your company will be. The adds would of course be targeted at hackers, such as come work for us, since only hackers read source-code. So it would be a very targeted ad (like the http-header thing). I don't know if this has been tried out in practice but why not, if even HTTP-headers are used for a similar purpose?

mholt 7y ago
Don't do it. People will hate you for it... and never, ever let you live it down. :-/
- niftich 7y ago
  He's speaking from experience. But, if your circumstances aren't exactly the same, the outcome may be different. Credits pages in software, accessible from the main UI, used to be very common, and having names there -- or embedded in source code -- doesn't violate a user expectation. Server software sending 'Server:' headers also doesn't violate user expectation, though some people prefer to turn these off. Custom headers that cannot be turned off have a higher likelihood of violating user expectation. To the OP: in open source projects, some users will attempt to remove undesired behavior, within the rights afforded by the license, but these exercises of copyright can interact adversely with trademarks and other brand protections, and with the surrounding (human) infrastructure and information-space around a project (e.g. names, URLs, references to services, secrets). Your attempts to reconcile such a situation are nontrivial, and both inaction and action have a high likelihood of resulting in bad press (e.g. user confusion about fork, or heavy-handed enforcement). The harm will persist long after the original situation has been resolved or mitigated.
  - galaxyLogic 7y ago
    > some users will attempt to remove undesired behavior, Surely. But a link in a comment to a supporter who helped finance the project is not really "behavior" is it? It is not part of the program that executes. So it is not "undesired behavior" since it is not behavior at all. But is it "undesired" in other ways? If you put in a copyright notice into the source code, that is a kind of advertising for whoever's name is in it. Often comments contain links to the website of whoever maintains the source-code. Is that undesired? If not then what would be so undesirable about putting in a link to the website of whoever supported the project financially. And if they paid for that, they would be supporting the project financially. And in the end isn't that what we want, financial support for Open Source projects?
- strken 7y ago
  Other than the Caddy debacle, there was a short-lived attempt to run ads in the output of npm install, which also backfired spectacularly: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20786981 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20786981. I think if there was a magic button to remove any and all advertising from the internet, most people would press it, consequences be damned. You really need to think hard before hitching your cart to that horse.
- lonelappde 7y ago
  Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, BSD License literally had an "advertising clause". The only question would be whether it should be used only for non-transferable "moral" authorship or transferable as the author chooses.
Maxious 7y ago
It has been tried And The Results Will Surprise You: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15237923 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15237923
fullstackchris 7y ago
> only hackers read source-code maybe I'm behind the times, but is 'hacker' now colloquial to mean 'anyone who codes'? Plenty of normal software engineers / devs, who are by no means 'hackers' (myself included) read the source code.
- Tepix 7y ago
  Inside the community, a hacker (as opposed to "cracker" or "security hacker") is someone who uses technology in a creative way.
  - fullstackchris 7y ago
    so what do we call undesirables like anonymous and so on?
    - nuclearnice1 7y ago
      "cracker" or "security hacker"
    - denni9th 7y ago
      "crackers" or "security hackers". I'm sure most people on this site would consider themselves to be some form of "hacker", after all, this is "Hacker News".
  - hwdug8278 7y ago
    My understanding of hacker is specifically someone who exploits vulnerabilities in code. Regular programmers are like building architects, hackers are like people holding up a mask so that the facial recognition powered NEST lock will let them inside the building.
- kyle-rb 7y ago
  You're actually too far ahead of the times. http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/ http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/
- galaxyLogic 7y ago

mholt 7y ago

Don't do it. People will hate you for it... and never, ever let you live it down. :-/

niftich 7y ago
He's speaking from experience. But, if your circumstances aren't exactly the same, the outcome may be different. Credits pages in software, accessible from the main UI, used to be very common, and having names there -- or embedded in source code -- doesn't violate a user expectation. Server software sending 'Server:' headers also doesn't violate user expectation, though some people prefer to turn these off. Custom headers that cannot be turned off have a higher likelihood of violating user expectation. To the OP: in open source projects, some users will attempt to remove undesired behavior, within the rights afforded by the license, but these exercises of copyright can interact adversely with trademarks and other brand protections, and with the surrounding (human) infrastructure and information-space around a project (e.g. names, URLs, references to services, secrets). Your attempts to reconcile such a situation are nontrivial, and both inaction and action have a high likelihood of resulting in bad press (e.g. user confusion about fork, or heavy-handed enforcement). The harm will persist long after the original situation has been resolved or mitigated.
- galaxyLogic 7y ago
  > some users will attempt to remove undesired behavior, Surely. But a link in a comment to a supporter who helped finance the project is not really "behavior" is it? It is not part of the program that executes. So it is not "undesired behavior" since it is not behavior at all. But is it "undesired" in other ways? If you put in a copyright notice into the source code, that is a kind of advertising for whoever's name is in it. Often comments contain links to the website of whoever maintains the source-code. Is that undesired? If not then what would be so undesirable about putting in a link to the website of whoever supported the project financially. And if they paid for that, they would be supporting the project financially. And in the end isn't that what we want, financial support for Open Source projects?
strken 7y ago
Other than the Caddy debacle, there was a short-lived attempt to run ads in the output of npm install, which also backfired spectacularly: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20786981 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20786981. I think if there was a magic button to remove any and all advertising from the internet, most people would press it, consequences be damned. You really need to think hard before hitching your cart to that horse.
lonelappde 7y ago
Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, BSD License literally had an "advertising clause". The only question would be whether it should be used only for non-transferable "moral" authorship or transferable as the author chooses.

Maxious 7y ago

It has been tried And The Results Will Surprise You: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15237923 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15237923

fullstackchris 7y ago

> only hackers read source-code maybe I'm behind the times, but is 'hacker' now colloquial to mean 'anyone who codes'? Plenty of normal software engineers / devs, who are by no means 'hackers' (myself included) read the source code.

Tepix 7y ago
Inside the community, a hacker (as opposed to "cracker" or "security hacker") is someone who uses technology in a creative way.
- fullstackchris 7y ago
  so what do we call undesirables like anonymous and so on?
  - nuclearnice1 7y ago
    "cracker" or "security hacker"
  - denni9th 7y ago
    "crackers" or "security hackers". I'm sure most people on this site would consider themselves to be some form of "hacker", after all, this is "Hacker News".
- hwdug8278 7y ago
  My understanding of hacker is specifically someone who exploits vulnerabilities in code. Regular programmers are like building architects, hackers are like people holding up a mask so that the facial recognition powered NEST lock will let them inside the building.
kyle-rb 7y ago
You're actually too far ahead of the times. http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/ http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/
galaxyLogic 7y ago