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Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

blog.desk.pm

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Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#101

Post by baddox »

astrange wrote: post #49
jusben1369 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you have to ask yourself the fundamental question. How does John make a living? Perhaps he could move to a paid subscription model. That seems fraught with risk but it's true it's a possibility. But even then you pander to your paid audience vs the paid advertiser (if all your paid subscribers are Apple fans and you noticed a 10% subscription cancellation when you belittle the Apple Watch what happens to your…

> Perhaps he could move to a paid subscription model. It was on a paid subscription model before the current one. Loading the site was free, but you had to pay for the RSS feed. Or maybe it was that buying a shirt got you RSS feed access for a while? Don't quite remember now.

You could buy a shirt and it came with the membership, or pay less for just the RSS membership. He delivered a personal RSS link with a random string. That worked until people moved to Bloglines, because it shared URLs among all its users and thus exposed private URLs to anyone looking for the daringfireball.com feed. At that point, he moved to password protected feeds, until people moved to Google News, which didn't support password protected feeds. This is when he began the weekly sponsorship model.

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#102

Post by collyw »

po wrote: post #89
bkmartin wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I try to boycott as many sites that use Taboola as possible... this can leave very few sites left to visit without hating myself... Them and Outbrain have to be the absolute worst that I see on "reputable" sites. You begin to truly understand a site's revenue integrity when you see these in their "Sponsored Content" sections.

This is why I personally don't like using an ad-blocker. If I have ads blocked, then I'm blind to the problems that the average internet user faces. I end up viewing, reading, tweeting, talking about sites that are flat out reader-abusive in their advertising. As a web developer, my sense of the state of the internet is warped. With ads turned on, I end up avoiding those sites and seeking quieter places. I have a bet…

I noticed the same problem when I sent a link to a friend. All this flashing blinking crap all over the page.

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#103

Post by collyw »

jonas21 wrote: post #10
cmyr wrote: post #5

Really interesting to see these numbers. I've been reading DF for years and years, and its is the only advertising model I've encountered that doesn't grate. His advertising is considerate, audience appropriate, and vetted. I feel good supporting his advertisers, because I feel good supporting him, and because they're just consistently things I'm happy to hear about. I would really love to see more independent journa…

I'd rather not. It introduces a pretty big conflict of interest (for example, Gruber would probably think twice before writing something negative about a former sponsor when he's on the record endorsing them) and blurs the line between advertising and editorial content. As mentioned in the article: > the cost today ranges between $8,000 – $10,000 dollars per placement and you get to write your own post, essentially M…

Grubers site is basically one big Apple ad from what I have read on it.

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#104

Post by dazne »

programminggeek wrote: post #97

I think his model works well for his blog. Not all blogs work well with this model and it doesn't necessarily scale well to a large news org. For what he does and how he does it, this is a cool model for both him, his audience, and apparently the advertisers.

Yes. Couldn't agree more. There're other bloggers in the tech/culture space like Jason Kottke of kottke.org, and Jim Dalrymple of The Loop, who make far less from advertising/sponsorships than Daring Fireball.

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#105

Post by saddington »

lhl wrote: post #100
saddington wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can always get a refund for the app... and I'm really sorry it didn't work for you. It's honestly really tough being an indie developer... I have to do EVERYTHING related to not just building the DAMN THING but all of the business, marketing, Q/A, financials/accounting, blogging... the list is eternally-long. v1.0 was lucky... in a lot of ways. v1.1 addressed a shit-ton of issues... v1.2, out in a week (hopefully…

Hey John, I ran into some similar issues as the parent w/ line breaks (and w/ the local/remote publishing stuff in general). I posted a couple of comments on the Desk.pm feedback forum and am compiling some notes as I poke around. I have maximal sympathy for the challenges you face and I think that the concept of focused-editing with seamless publishing is fantastic, especially since no one else has done it, and I'm…

this is great and you're right, software is never done, only abandoned ( http://john.do/software/ )...

the challenge is that i wasn't aware of many of the issues until we had a plethora of users (which is great). i can only catch so many via testing and alpha-users!

thanks for your patience, that means a ton. it really does as an indie developer.

finally, i try to point a lot of people to our community forum, which has grown quite nicely over the last 3 months. there's a lot of help there and said caveats. i can always do a better job in this department though, so, thanks for the kind reminder!

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#106

Post by saddington »

SafariDevelop wrote: post #99
saddington wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i've been really "nice" about every single comment here on HN... but i can't help but let you know that this comment is single-handedly the most pompous one of all. "substantial writing"...? really? "serious" writers? I could list 10,000 pieces of GLORIOUS work that was crafted on nothing more than "pen" and "paper" ... or perhaps just "paper" and "ink" and "typewriter"... PEN + PAPER == Maximally-minimal "app"... an…

>> Minimalist apps are for people who want to play 'pretend' at writing. > this comment is single-handedly the most pompous one of all. It is interesting to note that HN's commenting guideline is to "Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say in a face to face conversation." yet, the folks here are downvoting puranjay's neutral 'pretend' comment (not targeted at anyone in particular) while upholding yours (you don't…

this comment will go nowhere, but, i'll try...

you're right. i should have taken a step back here. i am being hypocritical and i am (was) wrong. great catch and thanks for that safaridevelop.

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#107

Post by SafariDevelop »

saddington wrote: post #106
SafariDevelop wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Minimalist apps are for people who want to play 'pretend' at writing. > this comment is single-handedly the most pompous one of all. It is interesting to note that HN's commenting guideline is to "Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say in a face to face conversation." yet, the folks here are downvoting puranjay's neutral 'pretend' comment (not targeted at anyone in particular) while upholding yours (you don't…

this comment will go nowhere, but, i'll try... you're right. i should have taken a step back here. i am being hypocritical and i am (was) wrong. great catch and thanks for that safaridevelop.

You are welcome, and thanks for acknowledging without getting defensive. My hypocrisy comment was not directed at you, but to the general HN crowd that upvoted yours while downvoting that of puranjay (it had negative votes at the time of my comment). I have seen this happen with my own comments which, although meticulously researched and not offensive, sometimes get down voted to oblivion just because I challenge a dominating belief here. It shows me that people can be all smart as they want, and yet continue holding on to their beliefs like a tribe member defending tribe values.

Re: Does Sponsoring Daring Fireball Work?

#108

Post by puranjay »

saddington wrote: post #76
puranjay wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a writer, I like the idea of a minimalist writing app. I really do. It feels natural. Just you and a blank screen so you can tap away and kill whatever demons are haunting you. Except there is a problem: serious writers need more than 'minimalism'. All the authors and novelists and long-form fiction writers I know have reams upon reams of notes, plot information, and character data cluttering up their MS Word (arg…

i've been really "nice" about every single comment here on HN... but i can't help but let you know that this comment is single-handedly the most pompous one of all. "substantial writing"...? really? "serious" writers? I could list 10,000 pieces of GLORIOUS work that was crafted on nothing more than "pen" and "paper" ... or perhaps just "paper" and "ink" and "typewriter"... PEN + PAPER == Maximally-minimal "app"... an…

Agreed and agreed.

Tolstoy didn't write War & Peace with Scrivener, after all.

But what Tolstoy did have was a thick notebook filled with copious notes.

As did every other writer.

Heck, there was a picture going round a few days ago of JK Rowling's huge spreadsheet with plot information, all written on paper.

Now, you can of course get yourself a notebook and take your notes and get your writing done in a minimalist app, but since we are talking about using the computer alone to get all your writing done, I won't bring pen and paper into the equation.

Desk replaces the typewriter. It doesn't replace the notebook and endless scribbles and marginalia.

For that, you still need a tool like Scrivener.

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