How We Make Money at Stack Overflow • Hacker News Board

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#51

Post by edblarney » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 5:58 PM UTC

lucb1e wrote: post #5

StackOverflow is an extremely valuable resource for all programmers. I've not seen the option anywhere, but a yearly donation would definitely be something I'd do for a substantial amount (substantial to me as a student, so it's not the moon but not a beer either).

"a yearly donation would definitely be something I'd do for a substantial amount"

There's a word for this, it's called 'subscription' : )

They provide a service, you pay for it.

It's how most of the world works.

I think the underlying issue is price discrimination: how to get the large numbers of those unwilling/unable to pay some value, while providing value to the higher order users as well.

It's a paradox that people will pay more for a coffee than they will something that can help them substantially :)

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#52

Post by finnh » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:02 PM UTC

BipolarElsa wrote: post #29

blowski wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, they do a pretty good job of balancing the needs of users and advertisers.

I ask a lot of question, and thus get banned from asking more... I wish they would have a "luxury" option for like 49.99 a year where students could ask like unlimited questions. Is this crazy?

How many questions does it take before you are banned?

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#53

Post by collyw » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:03 PM UTC

sosborn wrote: post #34

overcast wrote: post #31

At this point, I have no desire to participate in or help stackoverflow. The attitudes there are such hostile, elitist garbage, where someone is incapable of asking a question, because it will instantly be closed by the mods. God forbid they are a newbie to the site. Responses essentially amount to go RTFM. This sums it up well. https://hackernoon.com/the-decline-of-stack-overflow-7cb69fa...

> Responses essentially amount to go RTFM. Let's be honest, reading the docs should be everyone's first step before posting a question. So many questions follow the template of "I want to know how to do this but I don't want to put in any effort." The volume of those kinds of questions are what drove me away - not the moderation.

That works with well written docs.

Python standard docs are not great, trying to remember how to use capturing groups on regexes for example (which I use maybe once or twice a year), it takes wading through three or four screens worth of text to get what I want. The Stack Overflow answer is likely to be far more concise, and will give me the example I am needing near the top of the page.

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#54

Post by vintageseltzer » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:04 PM UTC

BipolarElsa wrote: post #29

blowski wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, they do a pretty good job of balancing the needs of users and advertisers.

I ask a lot of question, and thus get banned from asking more... I wish they would have a "luxury" option for like 49.99 a year where students could ask like unlimited questions. Is this crazy?

You may be interested in: https://www.codementor.io/

I have personally never used it and am unaffiliated with it, but a friend suggested it and has found it useful. He explained it to me as a dedicated, personal Stack Overflow.

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#55

Post by garysieling » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

BipolarElsa wrote: post #29

blowski wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, they do a pretty good job of balancing the needs of users and advertisers.

I ask a lot of question, and thus get banned from asking more... I wish they would have a "luxury" option for like 49.99 a year where students could ask like unlimited questions. Is this crazy?

There is a cost to other users in time spent sifting through questions, so it'd probably need to be a student only area. In a business environment this is something people pay for, but not $50 at a time.

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#56

Post by marxidad » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

lordnacho wrote: post #20

So is it cash flow positive? I hope so, because it's hands down the most useful site for programmers. I even got the gold medal for using it every day for a long time.

They make over 10 million dollars a year.

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#57

Post by erikbye » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

JamesBarney wrote: post #38

overcast wrote: post #31

At this point, I have no desire to participate in or help stackoverflow. The attitudes there are such hostile, elitist garbage, where someone is incapable of asking a question, because it will instantly be closed by the mods. God forbid they are a newbie to the site. Responses essentially amount to go RTFM. This sums it up well. https://hackernoon.com/the-decline-of-stack-overflow-7cb69fa...

Are there any Stack-Overflow style Q&A site with communities that feel more like Hacker News(high levels of politeness)?

Quora?

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#58

Post by tedmiston » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

> We are in the process of sending out an email now announcing Developer Story to the larger community in the hopes that we can help some percentage of developers. If that email is rejected, we’ll unsubscribe you. If you’re unresponsive to emails we send, we’ll unsubscribe you. If you mark it as spam, we’ll unsubscribe you.

How great it would be if every site would subscribe to such high standards. Bravo, SO.

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#59

Post by chubot » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:06 PM UTC

dolguldur wrote: post #24

Stackoverflow is the prime example for how a company can generate tremenduous value without making that much money. It's difficult to estimate its contribution to the world economy quantitatively, but I'd definitely say billions, many many billions.

How do you know they don't make that much money? I didn't see that anywhere in the blog post.

I agree that they make an enormous contribution to the world economy. Joel really did knock it out of the park -- remember expertsexchange? His goal was to get rid of that and it worked.

Re: How We Make Money at Stack Overflow

#60

Post by tedmiston » Tue, Nov 15, 2016, 6:08 PM UTC

overcast wrote: post #31

At this point, I have no desire to participate in or help stackoverflow. The attitudes there are such hostile, elitist garbage, where someone is incapable of asking a question, because it will instantly be closed by the mods. God forbid they are a newbie to the site. Responses essentially amount to go RTFM. This sums it up well. https://hackernoon.com/the-decline-of-stack-overflow-7cb69fa...

As someone who regularly advises new users to read the minimum complete verifiable example (MCVE) doc [1], both with review flags and in comments, I really think you should!

Unlike most manuals, it's a fairly short and incredibly well written document. Anyone who reads and follows most of it will be a very valuable user to the community. In fact, following it's process might lead you to figuring out your own questions before you submit sometimes, at least that's how it's worked for me. Sure, it requires effort, but it makes for a better experience all around.

[Many questions that I see get downvoted are authors that make no attempt to follow the guidelines, or have asked a question easily answerable in the standards docs for that language or library. Still, I often answer these personally to provide a bit of hand-holding because what's obvious to someone who's been working with a language for 5 years might not be to someone who's been with it for 1. It's hard to draw a line around obviousness. In any case, if you follow the guidelines you're likely to receive help.]

[1]: http://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve