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> This is one of the strengths of a federated system run by people who aren't looking to profit. People who aren't looking to make a profit (or even break even
by mfer 4y ago
> This is one of the strengths of a federated system run by people who aren't looking to profit.
People who aren't looking to make a profit (or even break even) means they are running a social media platform while funding it through some other means. What is that means of making money? What pays for the hosting and the time spent doing ops?
You can't take money out of the equation because you have hosting costs at the least.
How are things funded and why that way should be a conversation. Anything that ignores money ignores the reality of operating something on the Internet. That means it's not sustainable.
- otikik 4y agoThere’s lots of space between “not doing things for profit” and “not caring about money”.
- teraflop 4y ago"Trying to be self-funding" and "trying to make a profit" are very different things, and it doesn't make sense to conflate them. Even though funding wasn't the primary focus of this blog post, it seems to make it quite clear where the money was coming from: https://www.patreon.com/ashfurrow https://www.patreon.com/ashfurrow
- mfer 4y agoMoney was obviously an issue. $319 USD/month didn't cover the costs of running it. As noted in the post, "I’ve donated countless hours". Where is the line between "trying to make a profit" and "trying to be self-funding"? Trying to be funded off of donations is really hard and rarely works. Most of the time you need other funding models. If someone runs a biz where they run mastadon instances and the business breaks even (or just a little more) is that making a profit? How does an organization behind an instance make money to cover expenses? This has to be looked at.