Re: [Snowdrift-discuss] Development status
> Please stop the talking, the postponements, stop telling > people what you want to do and just do it ffs. Start with > something simple, do a prototype, get feedback, stop wasting > time. If you don't, your project will be a huge waste and > you'll be dead as soon as some other person who cares about > freedom decides to start a similar donation platform. And > let me tell you, when that happens people won't give a > glorious damn of your revolutionary snowdrift idea, they > will just care of a free platform that works (and if the > "snowdrift idea" turns out to be any useful, the cost of > adding that for them would be minimal compared to your cost > of fixing a broken platform). One quick note: the above has been my concern from DAY ONE. I wanted to launch before Patreon. We would have had first-mover advantage in this whole space. There's all sorts of reasons our platform and system *could* have become the main thing, and it's *awful* that didn't work out. But the reality is that we would have launched with a much more complex algorithm which would have been problematic in various ways. We now have a ton of things cleared up that we didn't have in place originally. We can take some solace in the ideas of later-mover success being possible. In the end, I care less that Snowdrift.coop succeeds than that society actually solves funding for public goods. Patreon is a positive step in that it frees some projects from relying on ads or proprietary restrictions. It isn't everything it should be. There's some tragedy to the situation here, but each step, including right now, the best choice is to go forward toward launch. Again: we NEED and WELCOME anyone to help keep us on track. Making all the right choices to find the shortest path to success is *not* easy, it's easy to get sidetracked. We may not know which path is the shortest or best, and perspective is always welcome. I'm still hopeful that this will succeed and make a real impact. But there's so many challenges yet to face. signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.snowdrift.coop https://lists.snowdrift.coop/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [Snowdrift-discuss] Development status
Hi Rosario, Thank you for caring enough to write in. I volunteered a bunch of time (mostly this past spring) doing project management and design; I'm currently slightly out of the loop (the semester is in full swing). That is to say, Aaron is much closer to the project than I am. I just want to give info/my thoughts on a few specific things: On Wed, Oct 19, 2016 at 2:41 PM, Rosario Suarez wrote: You've already spent probably more than 10 grands as well (I even donated to your campaign!), You can see our full accounting here: https://wiki.snowdrift.coop/operations/accounting You're working on [Snowdrift] as a spare time hobby. [...] I want to use and support Snowdrift just because there isn't anybody else out there that cares about freedom of software and art works. [...] But goddamn, you guys don't know how to manage a project! [...] You could already get hundreds of free developers if only you chose a language other than Haskell. Patreon was conceived slightly after Snowdrift.coop. We'd probably have launched before them if we'd also received $1m in venture capital. But then we'd also be beholden to an investor whose bottom line might not be freedom. One reason launching has taken so long is that we've only made one technical compromise to our ethics (using Stripe's proprietary js, which is limited to a single page). Snowdrift is more than a spare time hobby, but volunteers have full time jobs; the only time they can spend is their spare time. Those who work or have worked full time are making tremendous sacrifices to do so. Aaron decided not to pursue a PhD. The $2500 I spent on rent and food last spring came out of my own savings account, not any income I earned at the time. David alone has donated over $40k. That level of funding doesn't go that far. The ~$25k/year that Bryan has received is *far* below the going rate for development work. Was picking Haskell a choice that delayed our launch? Definitely. Did we suffer from the sunk cost fallacy with regards to starting over in another language? Probably. Given how close we are to launching now, though, that would only delay us further. Besides, if you don't know how to get this "snowdrift" idea going, just quit this bullshit and start with something simpler, for example classic, traditional donations and work your way to the "snowdrift" on a later time. We already accept traditional donations; if they truly worked, we'd have gotten enough money to launch a long time ago. Although, if traditional donations worked in the first place, funding public goods wouldn't be a problem and Snowdrift wouldn't need to exist. You should realize that I don't care about your project because the "Snowdrift" is any revolutionary idea; I just care about it because it's free, because I know the people working on it understand what freedom is, and because there is nobody else doing the same thing. And I feel most people feel the same. I can't speak for others, but I care about the project for the same reason you do... but I give my time to it only because I think it may succeed at funding public goods at a scale where many, many projects before it have failed. Please stop the talking, the postponements, stop telling people what you want to do and just do it ffs. Start with something simple, do a prototype, get feedback, stop wasting time. If you don't, your project will be a huge waste and you'll be dead as soon as some other person who cares about freedom decides to start a similar donation platform. And let me tell you, when that happens people won't give a glorious damn of your revolutionary snowdrift idea, they will just care of a free platform that works (and if the "snowdrift idea" turns out to be any useful, the cost of adding that for them would be minimal compared to your cost of fixing a broken platform). There's two things going on here. First off, there's actually a limited window for projects to launch. Hype tends to die off after around 2 years, and if it takes that long to get from our initial launch to a full, public launch, we've lost a lot of momentum needed to get people interested. That's really important to a platform that needs a large base of patrons to succeed. Second, none of us are in this for personal gain (although we will all gain personally from more high quality free software). If someone who understands freedom managed to provide adequate funding for free software and other public goods, we'd probably all rejoice, nix the snowdrift.coop project and lend our efforts to the project that has found success. If someone had the skills to make a crowdfunding platform work, the ethics not to sacrifice freedom for profit, and the inclination to spend enough time and effort to see that project launch, then why haven't they come forward to help whip us into shape and actually get launched? So we come to this: a small group of people with little project managem
[Snowdrift-discuss] Development status
Do you guys have any serious, practical, defined, concrete, real plan to bring Snowdrift up to a working state anytime soon? Because I've been following this project for years, and all I see is talk and talk and nothing ever happens. You've already spent probably more than 10 grands as well (I even donated to your campaign!), and all we have now is just a mailing list, and a white-page website with a bunch of comics on it. And now I've found this comment https://freepo.st/post/c59i7bf0ha#comment-r5loimcuf9 "we're struggling to get launched still", that needless to say made me very angry. Does it mean that you won't be ready for another 5 years? Is there any hope you'll have something by the end of this year? Because let's be honest, you're not working on Snowdrift as you'd work on a project that you want to succeed; you're working on it as a spare time hobby. I'm mad because I really think Snowdrift is a cool project, and *you* are cool people who care about free software. I want to use and support Snowdrift just because there isn't anybody else out there that cares about freedom of software and art works. And this is clear from your page https://snowdrift.coop/p/snowdrift/w/en/othercrowdfunding hundreds of websites, all of them suck because they either don't take freedom into consideration, or have ridiculous fees (they are not non-profits), or both. But goddamn, you guys don't know how to manage a project! Instead of hiring developers, you should hire a project manager who doesn't take bad decisions and who knows how to get this project going. You could already get hundreds of free developers if only you chose a language other than Haskell. Besides, if you don't know how to get this "snowdrift" idea going, just quit this bullshit and start with something simpler, for example classic, traditional donations and work your way to the "snowdrift" on a later time. Let's be real guys, sooner or later you will eventually have to implement other donation types (other than your "snowdrift" idea), just because people donate in many different ways (for example one time, or maybe once a year on christmas). So, if you can't get snowdrift going, just start with something simpler and build on that. You should realize that I don't care about your project because the "Snowdrift" is any revolutionary idea; I just care about it because it's free, because I know the people working on it understand what freedom is, and because there is nobody else doing the same thing. And I feel most people feel the same. Please stop the talking, the postponements, stop telling people what you want to do and just do it ffs. Start with something simple, do a prototype, get feedback, stop wasting time. If you don't, your project will be a huge waste and you'll be dead as soon as some other person who cares about freedom decides to start a similar donation platform. And let me tell you, when that happens people won't give a glorious damn of your revolutionary snowdrift idea, they will just care of a free platform that works (and if the "snowdrift idea" turns out to be any useful, the cost of adding that for them would be minimal compared to your cost of fixing a broken platform). Peace \o/ ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.snowdrift.coop https://lists.snowdrift.coop/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [Snowdrift-discuss] Development status
On 10/19/2016 11:41 AM, Rosario Suarez wrote: > Do you guys have any serious, practical, defined, concrete, real plan to > bring Snowdrift up to a working state anytime soon? Because I've been > following this project for years, and all I see is talk and talk and nothing > ever happens. You've already spent probably more than 10 grands as well (I > even donated to your campaign!), and all we have now is just a mailing list, > and a white-page website with a bunch of comics on it. And now I've found > this comment https://freepo.st/post/c59i7bf0ha#comment-r5loimcuf9 "we're > struggling to get launched still", that needless to say made me very angry. > Does it mean that you won't be ready for another 5 years? Is there any hope > you'll have something by the end of this year? Because let's be honest, > you're not working on Snowdrift as you'd work on a project that you want to > succeed; you're working on it as a spare time hobby. > I'm mad because I really think Snowdrift is a cool project, and *you* are > cool people who care about free software. I want to use and support Snowdrift > just because there isn't anybody else out there that cares about freedom of > software and art works. And this is clear from your page > https://snowdrift.coop/p/snowdrift/w/en/othercrowdfunding hundreds of > websites, all of them suck because they either don't take freedom into > consideration, or have ridiculous fees (they are not non-profits), or both. > But goddamn, you guys don't know how to manage a project! Instead of hiring > developers, you should hire a project manager who doesn't take bad decisions > and who knows how to get this project going. You could already get hundreds > of free developers if only you chose a language other than Haskell. > Besides, if you don't know how to get this "snowdrift" idea going, just quit > this bullshit and start with something simpler, for example classic, > traditional donations and work your way to the "snowdrift" on a later time. > Let's be real guys, sooner or later you will eventually have to implement > other donation types (other than your "snowdrift" idea), just because people > donate in many different ways (for example one time, or maybe once a year on > christmas). So, if you can't get snowdrift going, just start with something > simpler and build on that. You should realize that I don't care about your > project because the "Snowdrift" is any revolutionary idea; I just care about > it because it's free, because I know the people working on it understand what > freedom is, and because there is nobody else doing the same thing. And I feel > most people feel the same. > > Please stop the talking, the postponements, stop telling people what you want > to do and just do it ffs. Start with something simple, do a prototype, get > feedback, stop wasting time. If you don't, your project will be a huge waste > and you'll be dead as soon as some other person who cares about freedom > decides to start a similar donation platform. And let me tell you, when that > happens people won't give a glorious damn of your revolutionary snowdrift > idea, they will just care of a free platform that works (and if the > "snowdrift idea" turns out to be any useful, the cost of adding that for them > would be minimal compared to your cost of fixing a broken platform). > > Peace \o/ Thank you for the note, Rosario! You *might* be surprised at how rarely we get this sort of message. I mean, *I* think that Snowdrift.coop is extremely important and have taken it very seriously. It's been quite frustrating to talk with so many people who both recognize the potential *and* have the skills, resources, connections, to help us make it a reality and then have the vast majority never make the leap into truly helping it get there. Most don't even take the time to send us a note like this or otherwise. Now, having said that, a far greater portion of those folks would be up for helping if we had the whole plan so clearly structured and easy to approach that everyone knew just what to do and had just the right guidance to get into participating. Still, people come and go. And the work needed to figure out how to make a truly welcoming, effective, productive community is itself massive. I've been wanting to get around to writing a post about the challenges we've been facing, the struggles, mistakes, learning experiences, and most of all: expressing to everyone why this project is actually as or more ambitious than almost any out there. All along, part of me knew this was extremely challenging, but I'd hesitate to have pushed it forward if it seemed hopeless. I got by trying to believe the most optimistic folks. Now, a summary: Snowdrift.coop was started by two people: one with perspective on the mission, values, scope, and community-building; and one with technical expertise. It turns out that the technical expert was too optimistic in what was doable by himself or wha
Re: [Snowdrift-discuss] Appropriate message when login failed
That message is alot better than mine. Adding me would be great. Thank you! //Robert Från: Bryan Richter Skickat: den 18 oktober 2016 19:49 Till: discuss@lists.snowdrift.coop Ämne: Re: [Snowdrift-discuss] Appropriate message when login failed On Mon, Oct 17, 2016 at 03:56:21PM +, Robert Åberg wrote: > Issue: https://tree.taiga.io/project/snowdrift/issue/455 > > ?What would be a good message when the login is failing?. I received a > suggestion about suggesting a password reset. (In case the user just > forgot the password). Any other suggestions? It looks like Salt has a decent suggestion on the issue itself, so check back there! Robert, do you want me to add you to the project on Taiga using this email address? Then you can track/create/be assigned to issues. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.snowdrift.coop https://lists.snowdrift.coop/mailman/listinfo/discuss
