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Monetizing hobbies

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Re: Monetizing hobbies

#71

Post by DoreenMichele »

WJW wrote: post #70
DoreenMichele wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(In some cases a donation button may be better) If you are not a charity, do not call it a donation. Call it a tip .

Is there some legal distinction? Getting money with the expectation that it will be used to further some vaguely defined public good you are doing (writing freely available software in this case) sounds exactly like a charity, especially since you will be doing most of the public good regardless of whether you get the donation or not. A tip on the other hand is an additional payment for some good or service that you…

I'm a blogger, not a programmer. I don't make near enough money from it but calling it a tip instead of a donation has performed better.

Tip signals "payment for my work." Donation signals "gift."

People seem to be more inclined to actually fork over a few bucks if you signal "This is my work. I deserve to be paid for it." than if you signal "I would like gifts (or charity) from random internet strangers."

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#72

Post by deebosong »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #35
deebosong wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oops, for some reason I thought you were volunteering to help older folks, hence my comment (expressing I am a fan of the older cohort, as they carry much wisdom & grace). Didn't mean to express the opposite! Just to level the playing field, I've participated in orgs with "younger" leadership and have been burned, and also made my errors from my own arrogance/ lack of experience. The "good" that came out of that was…

What amused me, the most (except it wasn't really amusing, at the time. Looking back, I'm ROTFLMAO), was the recruiters. I have a pretty heavy-duty résumé. I've been shipping (not just "writing") software for over thirty-five years, and have a fairly big portfolio (that really only covers the last ten years of my work, and just the open-source portion of it). I've written APIs that have lasted 25 years. I do good wor…

Dang. Ageism sucks. Would be cool to have a culture change where those with more years & experience are honored, and seen as deep players on the team rather than as outdated.

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#73

Post by WJW »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #71
WJW wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there some legal distinction? Getting money with the expectation that it will be used to further some vaguely defined public good you are doing (writing freely available software in this case) sounds exactly like a charity, especially since you will be doing most of the public good regardless of whether you get the donation or not. A tip on the other hand is an additional payment for some good or service that you…

I'm a blogger, not a programmer. I don't make near enough money from it but calling it a tip instead of a donation has performed better. Tip signals "payment for my work." Donation signals "gift." People seem to be more inclined to actually fork over a few bucks if you signal "This is my work. I deserve to be paid for it." than if you signal "I would like gifts (or charity) from random internet strangers."

Interesting, thanks for the explanation!

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#74

Post by abhaynayar »

Helitioo wrote: post #18
turtledove wrote: post #16

Why do we feel the need to be 'productive' (in the economics sense) even in our leisure time? I'm not sure such an attitude is healthy or sustainable. We fought hard to get a 40 hour work week, why do we feel pressure to go back on that and work in our leisure time?

My personal development should not be driven by my work. Personal development means more than sitting in front of a tv. I want to need to work less so I can be productive for myself.

You can have personal development without being productive.

There are many hobbies where you don't produce or monetize anything, but they are still better watching TV. For example, playing a sport, learning an instrument, reading books, learning a new language, etc.

The distinction being whether you are producing something or learning something just for its own sake.

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#75

Post by DoreenMichele »

jlokier wrote: post #68
DoreenMichele wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(In some cases a donation button may be better) If you are not a charity, do not call it a donation. Call it a tip .

Fun fact: Tips are subject to income tax, donations are not. That may be relevant to people seriously monetizing their hobbies. (Whether something is, for tax purposes, a tip or a donation is determined by the reason the money is given, not what you call it, but if it's truly a donation then I'd be inclined to call it one just in case that influences some judgement further down the line.)

Years ago, PayPal had donate buttons and my recollection is there was text somewhere on the site indicating that if you hit $10k in donations, they would want a copy of your 501c3 or some such. It's one of the reasons I stopped using donate buttons.

These days, there are other monetization products but I'm not sure the IRS would approve of you calling it whatever you want for reasons of avoiding taxes.

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#77

Post by bradlys »

I think something missing here is return on investment and opportunity cost.

People here are using survivor bias to indicate what has went from a hobby to a full time career. While nice - not relevant for most young people these days. Truth is - very few can turn a hobby into a real profitable profession. This isn’t because they lack talent, dedication, or smarts. It’s because they lack timing (being born when a house in SV wasn’t $2.5m), lack the right hobby to monetize (e.g. dancing - a notoriously poorly paying job unless you’re in the top 0.01%), or lack the social capital necessary (again - many reasons for why this might not be possible for you. Your race, gender, orientation, class, and looks really could be holding you back here. In the case of dancing - you often need to be good looking too).

If you’re working in SF as a software eng making $400k/yr - just enjoy your hobbies and stop trying to monetize them. If you’re struggling for money - leetcode, system design, and being a rule following brown noser will do you 200x on your time investment.

Personally - I have no interest in trying to monetize my hobbies. There’s no chance they will ever have any return on investment that will make it worthwhile compared to what I get paid at my job. They are for pleasure and for enrichment of the mind.

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#78

Post by egypturnash »

mooreds wrote: post #62
AussieWog93 wrote: post #8

I've monetised my hobbies three times so far. All three times it has become lucrative, but none of them are hobbies any more. One of the important things along the way I've learned is that what makes hobbies relaxing and fun isn't about the specific task you're doing but the fact that it's about enjoying the process of making/doing rather than feeling pressure to deliver the end result. That's not to say I have any r…

> the whole adage about "do what you love and you'll never work another day in your life" doesn't apply to running a small business. Is that because when you turn a hobby into a business there are lots of non-hobby tasks and requirements? Like sales, marketing, etc, etc? Or because of the pressure of delivering the result? Or for some other reason?

My experience as someone who loves drawing and does often delightedly remind herself that her day job is sitting around a park drawing shit:

basically, yes, all of these reasons apply.

I'm good at drawing, not at selling myself; my work sells itself to a certain degree but that only gets you so far. Not everything I'm paid to draw is a thing I love to draw, either. And sometimes even a thing I love to draw becomes less fun when it has to meet someone else's approval; going back and forth with a client is a very different feeling than "I start drawing and I fix things I don't like until I'm happy with the piece".

Deadlines suck and I mostly arrange my work so as not to have any. Yes, this is a luxury. It probably means less money but I make enough to get by.

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#79

Post by [deleted] »

ffhhj wrote: post #49
13415 wrote: post #42

I monetized my German science fiction novels by publishing them on Amazon, but so far have regretted it. They generally get great reviews and sure have their readers, but mostly just one of them (by far not the best) sells well continuously. The rest would require marketing that is a completely different activity than writing books, and really not fun to me at all. Moreover, you invariably get the occasional bad or i…

You should convert them into ebook apps, something I have noticed is that nobody reads the reviews. Maybe give the first chapters for free and the rest paid. Just make sure the user knows that's the deal so they don't get frustrated.

[deleted]

Re: Monetizing hobbies

#80

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

deebosong wrote: post #72
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What amused me, the most (except it wasn't really amusing, at the time. Looking back, I'm ROTFLMAO), was the recruiters. I have a pretty heavy-duty résumé. I've been shipping (not just "writing") software for over thirty-five years, and have a fairly big portfolio (that really only covers the last ten years of my work, and just the open-source portion of it). I've written APIs that have lasted 25 years. I do good wor…

Dang. Ageism sucks. Would be cool to have a culture change where those with more years & experience are honored, and seen as deep players on the team rather than as outdated.

Well, I think what's happened, is twenty-something-year-old CEOs.

They may be brilliant, driven, creative, hardworking people, but they Just. Don't. Have. Scars.

They never really had the chance to run face-first into reality, while still in a position where the stakes are low, and there's more experienced folks around, to help them get back on their feet.

Their first mistakes are disasters, because they have it all on the line.

In the past, the older folks had the money and power, but were often locked up by caution, and lack of creativity.

The younger folks had the energy and creativity, but not the sense of mortality. They needed the money and power from the older folks, and the older folks needed that creativity, and, for lack of a better word, recklessness, that could drive their investments forward, so they had to work together.

These days, it's pure recklessness. The first forays into shipping are "bet the company," so failure is an E.L.E.

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