I think it's more like a hobby, it doesn't necessarily NEED to be profitable as long as you and other people enjoy it and contribute to it. So far I'm loving it and it really feels like a breath of fresh air compared to reddit, especially without the karma system
this post was submitted on 28 Jun 2023
76 points (94.2% liked)
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it is more sustainable to pay for your small chunk of a network than to pay for a monolith that encompasses everything
i hope lemmy.world doesnt become too big for its own good and becomes to big to upkeep
If it becomes too big for them, then can always shut down sign ups and direct people to other instances.
At this point, even Reddit is not profitable.
I know you probably have seen a lot of answers from others already and my answer would probably be the same as others (for obvious reasons) but I am going to answer anyway because you told me not to lurk. Please note that I am not an expert (or even somebody who knows much about business) so don't expect my answers to even be half correct.
If by profitable you mean "not making a loss" then probably yes as long as if there are enough donations to cover the expense of running the server.
But if by profitable you mean "making enough money to be sustainable long term" then my answer would be most likely not because it's not designed to make money (unlike ahem...certain platform)
"lemmy only counts users who posted or commented as active users."
What exactly did this mean? What are the benefits of being an "active" user, or the drawbacks for not? Does that impact the effectiveness of that user's up/downvotes, or something?
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The internet and even the web didn't need profit for many long years before the web went commercial. I've been publishing my own website since 1996 without advertising or asking for donations. I just publish it because I love the topic. Profit is NOT the be-all and end-all of existence.
Don't believe me? How much would you sell your children for?
Which ones?
The ugly one.
Plot twist: not everything needs to be profitable.
Waaah!? Profits are the key to life itself! Blasphemy!
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Phase 1: Collect underpants
In addition to all of the answers here, development costs for protocols like ActivityPub can be partially offset by grants by organizations like W3C that work to build open standards.
They aren't
I run my own instance just because I want to build a community that people can enjoy. I do it out of my own pocket and don't ask for donations of any kind. Not everything is about profit for some people. If I were running a site as big as Lemmy.world, then I would consider it, but only to cover some expenses.
This. We need to stop seeing such online gatherings as opportunities to be profitable. I personally view them as social interactions and opportunities to exchange random and interesting information. Water cooler talks or forums (the ancient greek/roman sort - I wonder how many shitposts those had).
When you invite people over to your house for a gathering (also incurring costs - even if people bring something to cover the catering bit, you still have to clean up afterwards) you wouldn't consider it as an opportunity to profit right? (Or you are and are just hosting an MLM party or have some sort of agenda to push).
I think you might really be asking about sustainability, not profitability (profit is what you have after all the bills are paid). It's generally donation-based. I'm sure different communities will have different ways of soliciting donations.
For larger, expensive instances, I'm partial to determining the cost of running a single user over some period of time (say, 5 years), and posting that little datum on the community info. Then, each user that donates that amount gets a badge reward. Users that pay double the minimum get a different badge, and so on. Cycle the badges every n years. Some users will have fancier badges, displaying a kindness for the poor and badgeless. Cultivate a culture of gratitude for those who support, and you won't have to worry so much about not having enough.
I dislike this idea because it creates "tiers" of users. Communities might not allow comments from anyone without at least the basic donation badge. Donations incentivized with perceived perks are made with selfish intent. The capitalist system has trained us that in order for people to do something, they must be given a sufficient reward.
This is not true. Using rewards as incentives to motivate people will create division among individuals. When rewards are introduced, the focus shifts from intrinsic motivation and personal satisfaction to the external reward itself. This leads to a competitive mindset where individuals start comparing themselves to others solely based on the rewards they receive.
For example, I've seen something as simple as a user tag being used to restrict and divide a community. (r/conservative comes to mind first).
The idea is to remove profit motive, and distribute the actual costs to the users or admins.
Same way as any enthusiast could have run their own BBS back in the day. The perk now is they're linked together.
I would be shocked if it stays like that forever everywhere, but since the early days there's generally been some way to eat the cost.
I would like to see the host push ads, so that it's sustainable. It doesn't have anything negative to the community except it will sustain the instance do does the Fediverse.
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They aren't, and due to the type of culture that is common here many users are outright hostile to any monetization other than charity. mastodon has had instances being defederated for the crime of attempting to introduce advertising or subscription.
It remains to be seen if this changes, but for now you're unlikely to start a fediverse instance for profit.