Comment by ozim
12 hours ago
What's with the "everything has to be monetized" or optimized for earning?
Why do people have to earn money on their hobbies?
Why a person can't just publish stuff for others to read?
Why should we be obligated to pay?
If someone has to make a living, maybe they should stick to a proper job not a hobby side gigs. Well I have a friend that makes living from basically making side gigs, but he is not looking to "make it big" - he just values freedom more and if he gets some money to just get by he is happy with it. He is not going to optimize conversion rate of paying supporters. But he is authentic that is why people who drop him some money do so - second he starts "revenue optimizing" I believe anyone who follows him will just drop it and move on.
> What's with the "everything has to be monetized" or optimized for earning?
> Why do people have to earn money on their hobbies?
> Why a person can't just publish stuff for others to read?
> Why should we be obligated to pay?
The Author:
> > Help support Res Obscura for its next 15 years…
Although you are not obligated to pay and nobody is forcing you, If this isn’t a problem for the author he wouldn’t be asking you for money.
But you do sound like this:
“Why do I have to pay for things?”
“Why can’t I consume things for free?”
Which sounds extremely entitled.
> If someone has to make a living, maybe they should stick to a proper job not a hobby side gigs.
This guy is an associate professor in history, not a working SWE or AI engineer like most people on HN.
Have you not considered that this person has a family to feed or rent to pay and just needs extra money?
Care to share? Or at lease describe to what extent they 'offer the ability to pay'?
I think many would like to live in that world. Good to see what an n=1 example of it looks like in practice.
I mean, at it's extreme, he wouldn't even be on the internet. But dialing that back, it could be as simple as a 'buy me a coffee' link.