6 ms·

Ask HN: What is your strategy for significant passive income in 2021?

22 points by throwaway_yc 6y ago

Is it too late for creating content on YouTube?

mtmail 6y ago
related from last year "Ask HN: What was your best passive income in 2020?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316912 and "Ask HN: What is your passive income 2020?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24859111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24859111
sigmaprimus 6y ago
I am seriously considering getting back into premium web design and management for the restaurant industry. The lockdowns have been brutal on the restaurant market but just as after a forest fire, new plants appear that are no longer shaded, the same explosive growth potential is there for new restaurant startups. A few hundred bucks a year contract for a simple menu website and domain name, with future service potential is an easy sell and they add up quickly into a substantial passive income.
- wikibob 6y ago
  The best restaurant website is a single page. Literally, one page. Address and phone number at the top. Days of the week and hours. Link to a PDF of the actual exact print menu. Link to their online ordering option of choice. Done.
  - kleer001 6y ago
    > Link to a PDF of the actual exact print menu. One would that that would be universally useful. But on mobile I find reading a PDF can be a pain sometimes. But yes, that should be good for 99.99% of restaurants and 99.99% of their customers.
  - sigmaprimus 6y ago
    Exactly, there really isn't much to it, but not everyone is as technicaly inclined as the average HN reader. You would think most restaurants would just do it themselves but my experience is that many of them don't want the hassle. It does involve in person cold calling but the researching of potential customers is easy(new restaurants without websites) and as far as not paying, I did run into that but it happened after the 1st year and all work and expenses for the first year are covered by the initial sale. I think it is more of a sales job and many people lack the confidence(or ego) for cold calling but I know it can create a significant passive income as lots of restaurants do keep paying year after year(especially if you are the domain name owner)
- 1123581321 6y ago
  Good luck. I can't see any reason why a typical restaurant would not just use one of the many online ordering services that throw in a splashy front page theme for free. We observe this as we serve vendors to restaurants.
- mattmanser 6y ago
  I've worked with two startups in this space. Restaurants are pretty bad customers. Not tech-savvy, high churn, can suddenly stop paying with no warning, don't have a lot of money. They won't be seeking you out, so you've got to do phone sales or even in person, then you're only charging a few hundred bucks? Doesn't work. It's one of the worst segments you can target, especially as you'll essentially be up against them simply having a Facebook business page or something like Wix with a PDF menu on it.
giantg2 6y ago
I guess everyone's definition of significant can be different. I'm probably just playing the stock market.
forgotmysn 6y ago
ETF's.
Jugurtha 6y ago
Tangential to this: I started uploading videos to YouTube recently. I was amazed by the fact some trivial things are not possible. For example: I uploaded videos to my account, and then wanted to transfer the videos to another account. This is not possible. I have to download the already uploaded videos, then upload them again to the new account. Second: in the Contents view of Studio, there's no way to know if the videos are in a channel, so I selected videos and added them to a channel. Result? The operation is not idempotent. The channel now contains several references to the same video. This is unfucking believable, as the product has existed for ages and there's no way I'm the only one to have this problem. The worst thing is that, the documentation and all the guids on the internet casually tell you to re-download the videos, and then upload them to the channel. How on earth this flow seemed acceptable is beyond me. Now, the next step obviously was to sort the videos in the channel by duration or name so I could quickly find the copies and remove them, right? Wrong. You can't sort videos by name or duration, only by upload date or publication date. What in the name of fuck. If I had time, I'd make a service to do just that. Based on the tutorials and questions and answers on reddit that find it totally normal to re-download videos that are already uploaded in order to upload them again, this is insane.
- dbrereton 6y ago
  Is this problem actually solvable? As in, does YouTube expose an API for doing the things you're talking about? If not, then there's really not much anyone can do about it.
  - Jugurtha 6y ago
    >Is this problem actually solvable? As in, does YouTube expose an API for doing the things you're talking about? https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3 https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3 The description from the above link: With the YouTube Data API, you can add a variety of YouTube features to your application. Use the API to upload videos, manage playlists and subscriptions, update channel settings, and more. >If not, then there's really not much anyone can do about it. If their API is unusable, then follow the steps in the documentation, only let a computer do it. Use OAuth to authenticate with the service, access user's content that may be public, private, or unlisted. On a user operation, say move videos from one account to the other, in the backend: download the videos to temporary files using a third party tool that I will not mention here, then upload them to the new account. If you want to skimp, mount the user's Google Drive account to store the videos temporarily (as a buffer), and then from their Google Drive to their YouTube account. This way you don't pay for storage and are scalable right off the bat. Then build everything on top of Google App Engine : D Except you'll have a harder time doing the mount operations if you're on GAE, I suppose. So you only receive requests, mount Google Drives, download videos there, then the videos to the user's account/channel. Yes, you could eventually use something "in-memory", but if you have a lof of requests, you'll have to account for that RAM, hence using the user's Google Drive account. Again, I'm thinking of this off the top of my head, but I think it checks out. The user only has to select the videos from the source, and choose a destination, click OK, done. Go for coffee or something, instead of downloading them and good luck for people with crappy internet to do that. Future versions may enable you to do CRUD on the videos on a usable interface, not like the Studio thing. Display accounts and channels and playlists like folders and move videos around like you'd do on a file explorer, etc. I may do that once to transfer my videos. Your bio is "Serial Side Project Maker"... :P
smarri 6y ago
A colleague of mine makes over $100k a year buying and selling art in his spare time.
rulambo 6y ago
I don't think there is any "passive" income in YouTube or creating something. Passive income flow is owning for example 20% of a farm which pays you out a share of their income every year. This being said, don't make it complicated. The last 10 years, putting your savings into FAANG was enough, and the next 10? Well, I am 3 years in BTC and it paid me well (2019: +60%, 2020: +350%, 2021: +80%). Watch 5 minutes of this (timestamped) https://youtu.be/ld8SBflZR7o?t=1033 https://youtu.be/ld8SBflZR7o?t=1033 And read this: https://twitter.com/RaoulGMI/status/1369038305187270658 https://twitter.com/RaoulGMI/status/1369038305187270658 Don't read Twitter, HackerNews or any other social media site regarding finance. Or at least, follow 1-2 people who know what they are saying. Stay otherwise away and make money.
- akudha 6y ago
  Is it too late to get into BTC?
  - rulambo 6y ago
    Have you taken your time and watched 5 minutes of the linked YouTube video? HedgeFunds are just starting to get into BTC. The price is still to low for them to allocate even 1% of their capital to it. When the price hits around 500k, then it is starting to get interesting. So, no. It's not.
  - csomar 6y ago
    It's definitively late if you are expecting the x100 returns, and significantly perilous now since prices have risen a lot recently.
  - dbrereton 6y ago
    Anyone answering this question for you is probably biased in either direction. You should do your own reading and decide for yourself. Here's a good article from 2018 that gives an argument on the bullish side: https://vijayboyapati.medium.com/the-bullish-case-for-bitcoin-6ecc8bdecc1 https://vijayboyapati.medium.com/the-bullish-case-for-bitcoi..., and here's a more bearish view: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.com/the-bit-short-inside-cryptos-doomsday-machine-f8dcf78a64d3 https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.com/the-bit-short-insid....
runawaybottle 6y ago
/r/wallstreetbets Start wheeling options.
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  /r/thetagang
  - runawaybottle 6y ago
    That’s supposed to be a secret friend.
clxxx 6y ago
I wouldn't say creating content on YouTube is "passive". If you want to make it work, I'd say there's a fair amount of work to be done. A high school friend and I recently started a finance YouTube channel about 2 months ago that does generate small income and is steadily growing (here's the channel for reference: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9IZYXzt4dl13MAycfoyMdQ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9IZYXzt4dl13MAycfoyMdQ) The only source of our income right now comes from Patreon (only $174/month). In comparison to my previous business ventures, considering there's no overhead and that there's no monetary risk associated with this sort of business, profitability so quickly feels unreal. But from researching larger channels, it seems Youtube functions more as a platform to leverage other channels (such as Patreon, or selling e-learning content) rather than just making revenue from ads. Ad revenue is tiny in comparison to those, or sponsorship deals, which should come in when the channel gains traction. In fact, at this point, much more revenue comes from actually just executing the trades or trading the stocks mentioned in the channel, but since that research is beneficial to us anyway, I suppose its a win-win. Hopefully things will swing more in our favor as the channel grows. I think in order to make any meaningful income through Youtube, the two most important factors seem to be consistency and a supportive niche. Hopefully when this question comes up in 2022, I could answer with more confidence about passive income through Youtube, but there's my two cents from my personal recent experience.
ElectricMind 6y ago
I do not want to discourage you but please humble request no to one more "influencer" or "YouTube personality" Or "YouTube celebrity". Even 5 years old is philosopher these days. smh

22 points by throwaway_yc 6y ago

Is it too late for creating content on YouTube?

related from last year "Ask HN: What was your best passive income in 2020?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316912 and "Ask HN: What is your passive income 2020?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24859111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24859111

sigmaprimus 6y ago

I am seriously considering getting back into premium web design and management for the restaurant industry. The lockdowns have been brutal on the restaurant market but just as after a forest fire, new plants appear that are no longer shaded, the same explosive growth potential is there for new restaurant startups. A few hundred bucks a year contract for a simple menu website and domain name, with future service potential is an easy sell and they add up quickly into a substantial passive income.

wikibob 6y ago
The best restaurant website is a single page. Literally, one page. Address and phone number at the top. Days of the week and hours. Link to a PDF of the actual exact print menu. Link to their online ordering option of choice. Done.
- kleer001 6y ago
  > Link to a PDF of the actual exact print menu. One would that that would be universally useful. But on mobile I find reading a PDF can be a pain sometimes. But yes, that should be good for 99.99% of restaurants and 99.99% of their customers.
- sigmaprimus 6y ago
  Exactly, there really isn't much to it, but not everyone is as technicaly inclined as the average HN reader. You would think most restaurants would just do it themselves but my experience is that many of them don't want the hassle. It does involve in person cold calling but the researching of potential customers is easy(new restaurants without websites) and as far as not paying, I did run into that but it happened after the 1st year and all work and expenses for the first year are covered by the initial sale. I think it is more of a sales job and many people lack the confidence(or ego) for cold calling but I know it can create a significant passive income as lots of restaurants do keep paying year after year(especially if you are the domain name owner)
1123581321 6y ago
Good luck. I can't see any reason why a typical restaurant would not just use one of the many online ordering services that throw in a splashy front page theme for free. We observe this as we serve vendors to restaurants.
mattmanser 6y ago
I've worked with two startups in this space. Restaurants are pretty bad customers. Not tech-savvy, high churn, can suddenly stop paying with no warning, don't have a lot of money. They won't be seeking you out, so you've got to do phone sales or even in person, then you're only charging a few hundred bucks? Doesn't work. It's one of the worst segments you can target, especially as you'll essentially be up against them simply having a Facebook business page or something like Wix with a PDF menu on it.

giantg2 6y ago

I guess everyone's definition of significant can be different. I'm probably just playing the stock market.

forgotmysn 6y ago

ETF's.

Jugurtha 6y ago

Tangential to this: I started uploading videos to YouTube recently. I was amazed by the fact some trivial things are not possible. For example: I uploaded videos to my account, and then wanted to transfer the videos to another account. This is not possible. I have to download the already uploaded videos, then upload them again to the new account. Second: in the Contents view of Studio, there's no way to know if the videos are in a channel, so I selected videos and added them to a channel. Result? The operation is not idempotent. The channel now contains several references to the same video. This is unfucking believable, as the product has existed for ages and there's no way I'm the only one to have this problem. The worst thing is that, the documentation and all the guids on the internet casually tell you to re-download the videos, and then upload them to the channel. How on earth this flow seemed acceptable is beyond me. Now, the next step obviously was to sort the videos in the channel by duration or name so I could quickly find the copies and remove them, right? Wrong. You can't sort videos by name or duration, only by upload date or publication date. What in the name of fuck. If I had time, I'd make a service to do just that. Based on the tutorials and questions and answers on reddit that find it totally normal to re-download videos that are already uploaded in order to upload them again, this is insane.

dbrereton 6y ago
Is this problem actually solvable? As in, does YouTube expose an API for doing the things you're talking about? If not, then there's really not much anyone can do about it.
- Jugurtha 6y ago
  >Is this problem actually solvable? As in, does YouTube expose an API for doing the things you're talking about? https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3 https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3 The description from the above link: With the YouTube Data API, you can add a variety of YouTube features to your application. Use the API to upload videos, manage playlists and subscriptions, update channel settings, and more. >If not, then there's really not much anyone can do about it. If their API is unusable, then follow the steps in the documentation, only let a computer do it. Use OAuth to authenticate with the service, access user's content that may be public, private, or unlisted. On a user operation, say move videos from one account to the other, in the backend: download the videos to temporary files using a third party tool that I will not mention here, then upload them to the new account. If you want to skimp, mount the user's Google Drive account to store the videos temporarily (as a buffer), and then from their Google Drive to their YouTube account. This way you don't pay for storage and are scalable right off the bat. Then build everything on top of Google App Engine : D Except you'll have a harder time doing the mount operations if you're on GAE, I suppose. So you only receive requests, mount Google Drives, download videos there, then the videos to the user's account/channel. Yes, you could eventually use something "in-memory", but if you have a lof of requests, you'll have to account for that RAM, hence using the user's Google Drive account. Again, I'm thinking of this off the top of my head, but I think it checks out. The user only has to select the videos from the source, and choose a destination, click OK, done. Go for coffee or something, instead of downloading them and good luck for people with crappy internet to do that. Future versions may enable you to do CRUD on the videos on a usable interface, not like the Studio thing. Display accounts and channels and playlists like folders and move videos around like you'd do on a file explorer, etc. I may do that once to transfer my videos. Your bio is "Serial Side Project Maker"... :P

smarri 6y ago

A colleague of mine makes over $100k a year buying and selling art in his spare time.

rulambo 6y ago

I don't think there is any "passive" income in YouTube or creating something. Passive income flow is owning for example 20% of a farm which pays you out a share of their income every year. This being said, don't make it complicated. The last 10 years, putting your savings into FAANG was enough, and the next 10? Well, I am 3 years in BTC and it paid me well (2019: +60%, 2020: +350%, 2021: +80%). Watch 5 minutes of this (timestamped) https://youtu.be/ld8SBflZR7o?t=1033 https://youtu.be/ld8SBflZR7o?t=1033 And read this: https://twitter.com/RaoulGMI/status/1369038305187270658 https://twitter.com/RaoulGMI/status/1369038305187270658 Don't read Twitter, HackerNews or any other social media site regarding finance. Or at least, follow 1-2 people who know what they are saying. Stay otherwise away and make money.

akudha 6y ago
Is it too late to get into BTC?
- rulambo 6y ago
  Have you taken your time and watched 5 minutes of the linked YouTube video? HedgeFunds are just starting to get into BTC. The price is still to low for them to allocate even 1% of their capital to it. When the price hits around 500k, then it is starting to get interesting. So, no. It's not.
- csomar 6y ago
  It's definitively late if you are expecting the x100 returns, and significantly perilous now since prices have risen a lot recently.
- dbrereton 6y ago
  Anyone answering this question for you is probably biased in either direction. You should do your own reading and decide for yourself. Here's a good article from 2018 that gives an argument on the bullish side: https://vijayboyapati.medium.com/the-bullish-case-for-bitcoin-6ecc8bdecc1 https://vijayboyapati.medium.com/the-bullish-case-for-bitcoi..., and here's a more bearish view: https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.com/the-bit-short-inside-cryptos-doomsday-machine-f8dcf78a64d3 https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.com/the-bit-short-insid....

runawaybottle 6y ago

/r/wallstreetbets Start wheeling options.

toomuchtodo 6y ago
/r/thetagang
- runawaybottle 6y ago
  That’s supposed to be a secret friend.

clxxx 6y ago

I wouldn't say creating content on YouTube is "passive". If you want to make it work, I'd say there's a fair amount of work to be done. A high school friend and I recently started a finance YouTube channel about 2 months ago that does generate small income and is steadily growing (here's the channel for reference: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9IZYXzt4dl13MAycfoyMdQ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9IZYXzt4dl13MAycfoyMdQ) The only source of our income right now comes from Patreon (only $174/month). In comparison to my previous business ventures, considering there's no overhead and that there's no monetary risk associated with this sort of business, profitability so quickly feels unreal. But from researching larger channels, it seems Youtube functions more as a platform to leverage other channels (such as Patreon, or selling e-learning content) rather than just making revenue from ads. Ad revenue is tiny in comparison to those, or sponsorship deals, which should come in when the channel gains traction. In fact, at this point, much more revenue comes from actually just executing the trades or trading the stocks mentioned in the channel, but since that research is beneficial to us anyway, I suppose its a win-win. Hopefully things will swing more in our favor as the channel grows. I think in order to make any meaningful income through Youtube, the two most important factors seem to be consistency and a supportive niche. Hopefully when this question comes up in 2022, I could answer with more confidence about passive income through Youtube, but there's my two cents from my personal recent experience.

ElectricMind 6y ago

I do not want to discourage you but please humble request no to one more "influencer" or "YouTube personality" Or "YouTube celebrity". Even 5 years old is philosopher these days. smh