7 ms·

Because we know a creator's sacrifice by not monetizing, money can buy them comfort, security and freedom (less time working, quitting job even). I don't think

Because we know a creator's sacrifice by not monetizing, money can buy them comfort, security and freedom (less time working, quitting job even). I don't think most people will fault anyone for choosing to monetise their work.

tomcam 5y ago
Completely concur
slg 5y ago
Flappy Bird was reportedly making $50k per day during its short initial peak after going viral. If I was the Wordle dev, I wouldn't go crazy and try to turn Wordle into a full fledged company. However unless the dev is independently wealthy I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization. There is probably enough potential their to ride a month or two of popularity to lifelong financial security. Why not take that?
- palijer 5y ago
  Why is it stupid to not do any monetization? Josh built a fun game for his partner, and now a lot more people are enjoying it. As long as it isn't horrendous in hosting costs, I'd say that is already a huge return on the project. Giving some great entertainment to folks is a win already in itself. Using your skills to the benefit of your community (global in this case) is one of the best things you can do. You don't need to profit off it as well to make it an intelligent project. It's not stupid to skip monetization.
  - slg 5y ago
    Because Josh could potentially monetize this project and allow both him and his partner to spend the rest of their lives doing nothing but making these fun projects for each other, working to benefit the global community, or whatever else they would want to do having achieved financial independence. I also don't agree with the idea that any form of monetization is inherently hostile towards players. The game takes up roughly 500px by 800px on a page that is receiving millions of hits a day. You can throw an ad on that page and barely impact the user experience while pulling in 4 or 5 figures per day. There is money to be made there without resorting to adding microtransactions or something actively hostile to users.
    - tlrobinson 5y ago
      I agree with most of what you said, but I’d consider ads to be just as hostile to users.
      - slg 5y ago
        Can you explain why replacing whitespace with a static banner ad is user hostile? I simply don't understand how someone can view that as on the same level as something like microtransactions.
        tlrobinson 5y ago
        One way to look at it: advertisements are trying to influence your thoughts and behavior. At least micro-transactions are (or can be) a simple and honest exchange of money for a service.
        michaelt 5y ago
        The moment you add advertising, you need to welcome a bunch of tracking and spying on users, an unavoidable cookie consent popover, a huge network of unchecked 'partners' any of whom can serve the latest browser exploits to your users, and the ads will be tasteless - scams, malware, and grinning mouths full of rotten teeth.
        slg 5y ago
        None of this is a requirement of advertising. Adsense isn’t the only form of internet advertising. There is a reason I said a static banner ad. It can be as simple as a native HTML anchor element with an image inside.
        true_religion 5y ago
        You don’t have to do any of that. You can sell advertising directly to companies, and moderate all content before it’s displayed to a user. A lot of people don’t like that because it takes away from your true focus: content creation or software development.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- fsloth 5y ago
  "I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization." Maybe he does not care monetization? Or there is no obvious path to monetization? If you start an app phenomena from scratch with no inbuilt monetization mechanism designed from the start I would imagine implementing one would be non-trivial? Or is there an "obvious and simple" method to monetize said work?
- exreddit 5y ago
  > independently wealthy He should have a sweet reddit IPO coming his way, soon.
- md_ 5y ago
  Surely the real idiots are the open source developers who give away code for free. Suckers.
  - hammyhavoc 5y ago
    Explain the logic behind this.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - necovek 5y ago
      Not the GP, but my guess would be: irony.
      - IndySun 5y ago
        >Not the GP, but my guess would be: irony. It's sarcasm, actually. A rare event here. Surely, irony is depicted in the open-source, decentralised crowd, berating someone doing something not for money.
        necovek 5y ago
        Sarcasm is, by definition, use of irony to be a bit meaner than just make fun of something. It's still irony, and I am not even sure it qualifies for the sarcastic qualities on top. I find that sarcasm or irony are pretty frequent on HN, or maybe it's just me who thinks it is so. ;-)
        IndySun 5y ago
        I think your definition is acceptable, in this forum context. And yes, I see it here too, and try to reward it, though, alas, you and I are few.
  - IndySun 5y ago
    >Surely the real idiots are the open source developers who give away code for free. Suckers. A perfectly sarcastic remark. Rare to see here. "Take my up vote" (or something like that). Oh wait... Or are you serious?
- declnz 5y ago
  > I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization. This statement makes me sad.
- true_religion 5y ago
  Also… if you consider the size of most companies, 50k per day turns into 17 million a year. Now you won’t be exactly poor, but it’s not the same thing as having won the lottery since you still need to pay for staff, marketing, etc.
- treebog 5y ago
  > I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization. This may be a popular sentiment on hacker news but thankfully it is an unpopular view among the best programmers. If everyone thought like this, there would be no Linux, no GNU. We’d all be reading this in Internet Explorer on Windows
  - slg 5y ago
    Open source doesn’t mean there is no monetization strategy. For example you could be using Firefox on Ubuntu. Both of those are monetized. Plus most open source software couldn’t monetize as easily or harmlessly as a webpage.
peruvian 5y ago
The creator has a good resume of tech work including two years at reddit where he created two viral campaigns and probably received stock for their upcoming IPO. Seems he's pretty comfortable and just wanted to do this for fun.

tomcam 5y ago

Completely concur

slg 5y ago

Flappy Bird was reportedly making $50k per day during its short initial peak after going viral. If I was the Wordle dev, I wouldn't go crazy and try to turn Wordle into a full fledged company. However unless the dev is independently wealthy I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization. There is probably enough potential their to ride a month or two of popularity to lifelong financial security. Why not take that?

palijer 5y ago
Why is it stupid to not do any monetization? Josh built a fun game for his partner, and now a lot more people are enjoying it. As long as it isn't horrendous in hosting costs, I'd say that is already a huge return on the project. Giving some great entertainment to folks is a win already in itself. Using your skills to the benefit of your community (global in this case) is one of the best things you can do. You don't need to profit off it as well to make it an intelligent project. It's not stupid to skip monetization.
- slg 5y ago
  Because Josh could potentially monetize this project and allow both him and his partner to spend the rest of their lives doing nothing but making these fun projects for each other, working to benefit the global community, or whatever else they would want to do having achieved financial independence. I also don't agree with the idea that any form of monetization is inherently hostile towards players. The game takes up roughly 500px by 800px on a page that is receiving millions of hits a day. You can throw an ad on that page and barely impact the user experience while pulling in 4 or 5 figures per day. There is money to be made there without resorting to adding microtransactions or something actively hostile to users.
  - tlrobinson 5y ago
    I agree with most of what you said, but I’d consider ads to be just as hostile to users.
    - slg 5y ago
      Can you explain why replacing whitespace with a static banner ad is user hostile? I simply don't understand how someone can view that as on the same level as something like microtransactions.
      - tlrobinson 5y ago
        One way to look at it: advertisements are trying to influence your thoughts and behavior. At least micro-transactions are (or can be) a simple and honest exchange of money for a service.
      - michaelt 5y ago
        The moment you add advertising, you need to welcome a bunch of tracking and spying on users, an unavoidable cookie consent popover, a huge network of unchecked 'partners' any of whom can serve the latest browser exploits to your users, and the ads will be tasteless - scams, malware, and grinning mouths full of rotten teeth.
        slg 5y ago
        None of this is a requirement of advertising. Adsense isn’t the only form of internet advertising. There is a reason I said a static banner ad. It can be as simple as a native HTML anchor element with an image inside.
        true_religion 5y ago
        You don’t have to do any of that. You can sell advertising directly to companies, and moderate all content before it’s displayed to a user. A lot of people don’t like that because it takes away from your true focus: content creation or software development.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
fsloth 5y ago
"I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization." Maybe he does not care monetization? Or there is no obvious path to monetization? If you start an app phenomena from scratch with no inbuilt monetization mechanism designed from the start I would imagine implementing one would be non-trivial? Or is there an "obvious and simple" method to monetize said work?
exreddit 5y ago
> independently wealthy He should have a sweet reddit IPO coming his way, soon.
md_ 5y ago
Surely the real idiots are the open source developers who give away code for free. Suckers.
- hammyhavoc 5y ago
  Explain the logic behind this.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - necovek 5y ago
    Not the GP, but my guess would be: irony.
    - IndySun 5y ago
      >Not the GP, but my guess would be: irony. It's sarcasm, actually. A rare event here. Surely, irony is depicted in the open-source, decentralised crowd, berating someone doing something not for money.
      - necovek 5y ago
        Sarcasm is, by definition, use of irony to be a bit meaner than just make fun of something. It's still irony, and I am not even sure it qualifies for the sarcastic qualities on top. I find that sarcasm or irony are pretty frequent on HN, or maybe it's just me who thinks it is so. ;-)
        IndySun 5y ago
        I think your definition is acceptable, in this forum context. And yes, I see it here too, and try to reward it, though, alas, you and I are few.
- IndySun 5y ago
  >Surely the real idiots are the open source developers who give away code for free. Suckers. A perfectly sarcastic remark. Rare to see here. "Take my up vote" (or something like that). Oh wait... Or are you serious?
declnz 5y ago
> I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization. This statement makes me sad.
true_religion 5y ago
Also… if you consider the size of most companies, 50k per day turns into 17 million a year. Now you won’t be exactly poor, but it’s not the same thing as having won the lottery since you still need to pay for staff, marketing, etc.
treebog 5y ago
> I honestly think it is a little stupid not to do any monetization. This may be a popular sentiment on hacker news but thankfully it is an unpopular view among the best programmers. If everyone thought like this, there would be no Linux, no GNU. We’d all be reading this in Internet Explorer on Windows
- slg 5y ago
  Open source doesn’t mean there is no monetization strategy. For example you could be using Firefox on Ubuntu. Both of those are monetized. Plus most open source software couldn’t monetize as easily or harmlessly as a webpage.

peruvian 5y ago

The creator has a good resume of tech work including two years at reddit where he created two viral campaigns and probably received stock for their upcoming IPO. Seems he's pretty comfortable and just wanted to do this for fun.