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Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

blog.ecosia.org

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Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#21

Post by zbyforgotp »

stavros wrote: post #12
dwedge wrote: post #8

I'm sure Ecosia are a good company, but headlines like this always make me a little suspicious. Non profits make a lot of money for their founders without it ever being "profit". Ecosia are reporting just over 600K euros a month in wages, I'd love to see the split and what % of that goes to the CEO. You don't need to sell a business if you have plenty of income from it every month - especially if now that can't be ta…

No, but it aligns with the interests of the consumers better if you're actually targeting consumers (for the recurring revenue) rather than burning cash to get as many users as you can lock in, and then selling to someone who will milk them when they have no option.

They can do the milking without selling - don’t they?

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#22

Post by 3OCSzk »

notachatbot123 wrote: post #18

[flagged]

AI has gotten cheaper and it will be even more in the future. This will eventually break even, comparing the cost of conventional web search vs AI on some cases. It is not the same as bitcoin where it requires more energy to get less value

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#23

Post by onli »

stakhanov wrote: post #5

Does anybody happen to have a pointer to further research this "Steward Owned company" legal structure? Since they're based in Germany, I assume this is a translation of a German legal term of sorts, but I couldn't find the original or anything that would let me learn more about it.

https://purpose-economy.org/en/companies/ gives an impression if you click through to the company descriptions, they tend to explain what is meant. Otherwise the term seems to be understood in English, there is a wikipedia article that seems correct to me. Or was that one missing the information you seek?

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#24

Post by stavros »

dwedge wrote: post #20
stavros wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm, I've seen this line of argumentation a lot, and I'd like to name it as a fallacy. It's basically "perfect is the enemy of the good", where one good action is dismissed because it's still not perfect. The product will get less bad for me when chasing revenue from me than how bad it will get for me when it's chasing revenue from someone who isn't me.

> The product will get less bad for me when chasing revenue from me than how bad it will get for me when it's chasing revenue from someone who isn't me. I'd like to name this as a fallacy - begging the question. The product will be better chasing revenue from you because it will be worse chasing revenue from someone else. Every company has the option of chasing extra revenue from customers. This company has no other…

> I'd like to name this as a fallacy - begging the question. The product will be better chasing revenue from you because it will be worse chasing revenue from someone else.

I said the product will be better for me. I generally believe that things are better for me when they're trying to entice me versus when they're trying to entice someone who isn't me, but we can debate that, if you want.

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#25

Post by blankton »

stakhanov wrote: post #5

Does anybody happen to have a pointer to further research this "Steward Owned company" legal structure? Since they're based in Germany, I assume this is a translation of a German legal term of sorts, but I couldn't find the original or anything that would let me learn more about it.

It sounds like a gGmbH, but the Imprint (https://www.ecosia.org/imprint) still says Ecosia GmbH (-> For-Profit).

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#26

Post by dwedge »

stavros wrote: post #24
dwedge wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The product will get less bad for me when chasing revenue from me than how bad it will get for me when it's chasing revenue from someone who isn't me. I'd like to name this as a fallacy - begging the question. The product will be better chasing revenue from you because it will be worse chasing revenue from someone else. Every company has the option of chasing extra revenue from customers. This company has no other…

> I'd like to name this as a fallacy - begging the question. The product will be better chasing revenue from you because it will be worse chasing revenue from someone else. I said the product will be better for me . I generally believe that things are better for me when they're trying to entice me versus when they're trying to entice someone who isn't me, but we can debate that, if you want.

I agree with you that it's usually true, I just don't agree that it has to be true. When a company is well funded and focusing on userbase, that's great. When they need more money, it might not be. I know they are totally different types of companies, but look at social networks - when they are expanding they are good for everyone, once they decide it's time to earn more money from their exist users (focusing on the user) that's when it gets worse.

In Ecosia's case it's different I think - without accounts and nothing keeping you there, every customer today is a customer that needs enticing again tomorrow.

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#27

Post by iregina »

stavros wrote: post #13
dmbche wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You pay for search and email? What services do you use? May I ask you why, if you're wanting to go into it?

Not the GP, but I pay for Fastmail because it's just so much better than Gmail, and I pay for Kagi sometimes because it's generally better than Google.

How is Fastmaol? Is it inconvenient to not use Gmail?

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#28

Post by rcMgD2BwE72F »

dmbche wrote: post #4
aswerty wrote: post #3

I really like the idea of Ecosia and Steward Owned companies, but as somebody who wants out of the Ad game completely, uses uBlock Origin religiously and pays for services like email and search. I haven't actually used Ecosia, but am interested in others experiences with it. But I imagine in the HN crowd a lot of other people fit the same profile as myself.

You pay for search and email? What services do you use? May I ask you why, if you're wanting to go into it?

Fastmail and Kagi. The former is amazing – Gmail UX and speed is atrocious in comparison, and the latter is amazing to find reliable, to-the-point results.

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#29

Post by mrweasel »

conaclos wrote: post #2

Does anyone use Ecosia every day? How does it compare with DuckDuckGo and Qwant?

Yes, I haven't used Qwant though. I'd say it's pretty equal to DuckDuckGo, maybe a little better after they started mixing in Google results. Generally speaking I do think that the Bing powered search engines does much better than Google, but Ecosia had a few specific searches where it's would fail me, that's gone now.

Re: Trees not profits: we're giving up our right to ever sell Ecosia (2018)

#30

Post by hyperbrainer »

iregina wrote: post #27
stavros wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the GP, but I pay for Fastmail because it's just so much better than Gmail, and I pay for Kagi sometimes because it's generally better than Google.

How is Fastmaol? Is it inconvenient to not use Gmail?

Not parent, but: The primary inconvenience I see with de-googling is just the sheer number of things that become just slightly harder. For one, Login with Google. Now, I know people de-googling will probably want to have separate accounts rather than SSO anyways, but it is an important consideration. You also lose GDrive and the GSuite in general, which alternatives exist, yes, but IMO not as good. Also, most people who work online on GDocs will now find it inconvenient to collaborate with you.
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