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GitHub Sponsors

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Re: GitHub Sponsors

#311

Post by behringer »

benatkin wrote: post #209

Not so fast. People have said this about gittip (now Gratipay), Patreon, Twitch, and now YouTube and Facebook. All of these have been mixed blessings. Here's an article about how Patreon doesn't work out even when everything goes smoothly: https://theoutline.com/post/2571/no-one-makes-a-living-on-pa... "After launching my Patreon, I struggled for months to find work. Patreon filled my downtime, and became a full time…

I don't know how everyone else uses patreon, but I don't even look at the garbage people post on their patreon. I'm subscribed literally only to support the work they are actually doing. Not their progress updates.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#312

Post by techntoke »

return1 wrote: post #164
thrownaway954 wrote: post #141

this would a slam dunk if you could sponsor projects or organizations besides just developers. if that happened, this would destroy patreon and paypal in the donation space for OSS projects.

otoh, sponsoring developers avoids the friction between teams about how to share sponsorships etc. they should offer both though

No, it gives the owners of the team/org the ability to distribute funds as they wish. There should be no friction.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#313

Post by behringer »

benatkin wrote: post #299
wpietri wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only a hard sell if you have to run it by accounting. But this is the kind of thing that I would have happily just expensed. It's a known vendor, and if I'm dropping $20/month on some vague software expense, nobody will care. Note also that the product lets people "choose from multiple sponsorship tiers, with monthly payment amounts and benefits that are set by the sponsored developer." That opens up much bigger…

> It's a known vendor, and if I'm dropping $20/month on some vague software expense, nobody will care. If you said the money is going to GitHub, and it's actually going through GitHub, that's lying. I think it will probably show up differently on credit card statements anyway, so people won't be tempted to do this behind the backs of the accounting department.

Could you imagine getting audited and your boss finding out you donated $xxxx dollars in donated patronage to others? I would not want to be the one in that room...

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#314

Post by techntoke »

OrangeManBad wrote: post #33
gigatexal wrote: post #9

Leave it to Microsoft to finally figure out a way to get people and more importantly businesses to fund OSS work.

* Getting linux on desktop. Check * Getting OSS contributors paid. Check Unlike Google, it seems Microsoft (Satya) isn't just doing OSS for PR but he probably sincerely believes in it. Thanks also to Hanselman who seemingly has been a major pro-OSS voice.

WSL is absolutely terrible and can't be taken seriously.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#315

Post by TimothyBJacobs »

C4stor wrote: post #281
smudgymcscmudge wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GitHub is vetting applicants. If they do get hoodwinked, they are at least getting hoodwinked into giving money to somebody they thought was doing worthwhile work to begin with.

So your hypothesis is that they'd rather assume this potential cost for the sake of publicity ? Also, in the "paid to sponsor" scenario they'd be hoodwinke into giving money both to someone worthwhile and someone totally unknown to them. I'd be really curious to know the technical or legal possibles responses.

The whole concept of giving away matching funds is for publicity.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#316

Post by ryeguy_24 »

benatkin wrote: post #209

Not so fast. People have said this about gittip (now Gratipay), Patreon, Twitch, and now YouTube and Facebook. All of these have been mixed blessings. Here's an article about how Patreon doesn't work out even when everything goes smoothly: https://theoutline.com/post/2571/no-one-makes-a-living-on-pa... "After launching my Patreon, I struggled for months to find work. Patreon filled my downtime, and became a full time…

Don't really know how a single anecdotal experience can be used to extrapolate the value of the concept. This is about pay per value. If enough people value something and have enough ethical principle, they'll contribute. You can make a lot money if you add value to people. I pay $5 a month to a Fitness coach who posts amazing videos on youtube for free. It's valuable to me, so I return the favor. If someone falls on the street, we rush over help them up. The same concept needs to start applying for development.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#317

Post by rswail »

koolba wrote: post #178

> To supercharge community funding, GitHub created the GitHub Sponsors Matching Fund, which matches up to $5000 per sponsored developer in their first year of sponsorship. In the first year, GitHub will not charge any fees, so 100% of sponsorships will go to the sponsored developer. In the future, we may charge a nominal processing fee. What's to stop me^Wsomeone else and their friend from sponsoring each other for $…

If Github aren't doing KYC and AML, then their payment processor better have. Otherwise this is the swiftest way I've seen to make $5K.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#318

Post by rswail »

nlowell wrote: post #304
pluma wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know whether you're trolling or simply naive but that's clearly fraud and the scenario you describe explicitly aims to commit fraud. At the very least it's violating the terms of service. But very clearly the two of you would have conspired to defraud GitHub and in this case there would even be evidence in the form of an HN comment where you literally ask if this would work. You may think you're clever but tr…

I'm not the other guy, but I honestly don't see an argument for why this is fraud. Is this against the terms? Can you point to a specific line in the terms forbidding this? Your argument just seems like "this is clearly fraud and you can tell by looking at it"...

Here there's an offence known as "theft by deception" which would probably cover what is effectively a conspiracy to do so.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#319

Post by techntoke »

asdkhadsj wrote: post #157

Well damn, this is sneaky and I love it. I say sneaky, because I was in a situation where I mentally debated Github vs Gitlab. This tips it a bit towards Githubs favor. Not that I'm even planning on being sponsored or w/e, but simply that I already view GH as a social network for a thing I love (code), but now it seems even more.. socially.. if that makes sense. Purely my perception of course.

GitLab actually has an open source SCM that you can selfhost.

Re: GitHub Sponsors

#320

Post by dawhizkid »

It looks like you sponsor an individual and not necessarily an entire project. I get that it is wayyy less complex to build that MVP, but I wonder how project dynamics will change if you have a team of, say, 3 core contributors that are in actuality dividing work fairly evenly but one contributor is for some reason getting 50%, 100%, 200%+ more in contributions than another contributor.
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