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"If that's the case, then charging 'market value' still wouldn't work, would it?" That is not true. If a price is set at a certain point at the start, then it
by jgmmo 15y ago
"If that's the case, then charging 'market value' still wouldn't work, would it?"
That is not true. If a price is set at a certain point at the start, then it doesn't take hundreds or thousands of bids from users in order to reach the market value. I'm sure Alexis's time is worth north of 500 an hour - wouldn't it be interesting if he could charge that much and give to charity? instead of hoping that thousands of HN readers will bid some quarters and maybe muster a grand total of 50 dollars for a whopping hour of donated time for charity.
If all the losers bids were still collected, penny auction style, then maybe there is a way it can net more than the 'set value' method of pricing. Otherwise it seems like charities would be losing a lot of money, atleast for the time being while the markets are inefficient and you can hire tech gurus for $1 a minute.
- chrischen 15y agoBut what about helping scrappy entrepreneurs? Why is donating $500 to charity better than say Alexis donating $500 worth of time to entrepreneurs and $50 to charity? I mean this service is mainly about connecting entrepreneurs, and not a necessarily about fundraising for charity, right? Also, to reach $500, you would only need two people bidding on one time slot who are willing to pay that much and it will reach that value.