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0 pointscodr710mo ago0 comments

From my experience it's VERY rare for people to pay for anything unless they're forced, I do the same thing even though I'm very aware of the need for compensating creators.

Talk is cheap, and people talk a lot about supporting projects.

Maybe if we could make some kind of statistics over the number of projects that were abandoned because maintainers didn't feel like working and dealing with random people for free anymore. Make the consequences of freeloading visible somehow.

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__MatrixMan__10mo ago

That has been my experience as well. I consider it a bug. I'm not proposing that we all just try harder to be altruistic, but rather that we craft some institution for rewarding people who have solved problems for many without encumbering those solutions with a monetization scheme.

Make like, a week long "holiday" where you either verify that your company has made an adequate donation to the OSS maintainers that make their products possible, or we all just go on strike for that week. Or... something. I'm sure somebody has a better idea than mine, lets get creative.

bdzr10mo ago

> I'm not proposing that we all just try harder to be altruistic, but rather that we craft some institution for rewarding people who have solved problems for many without encumbering those solutions with a monetization scheme.

> I'm sure somebody has a better idea than mine, lets get creative.

Every creative scheme I've seen someone try to come up with fails to do what charging money for a product can. Charge money for stuff, have a free tier, enjoy sustainable software.

__MatrixMan__10mo ago

That's fine for software that can still scratch the itch after it has been turned into a product, but I think there's a lot of unexplored space outside that category.

There's also a bunch of cases where adding tiers and payment flows blows the complexity budget and now what used to be a good idea is no longer worth it.

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0 pointscodr710mo ago0 comments

From my experience it's VERY rare for people to pay for anything unless they're forced, I do the same thing even though I'm very aware of the need for compensating creators.

Talk is cheap, and people talk a lot about supporting projects.

0 comments

__MatrixMan__10mo ago

bdzr10mo ago

> I'm sure somebody has a better idea than mine, lets get creative.

Every creative scheme I've seen someone try to come up with fails to do what charging money for a product can. Charge money for stuff, have a free tier, enjoy sustainable software.

__MatrixMan__10mo ago

That's fine for software that can still scratch the itch after it has been turned into a product, but I think there's a lot of unexplored space outside that category.

There's also a bunch of cases where adding tiers and payment flows blows the complexity budget and now what used to be a good idea is no longer worth it.

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse