As most of you know, we created Hubski to get rich. As the old adage goes, "If you want to print money, start a social aggregator".
thenewgreen only drinks bourbon bottled before he was born, insomniasexx collects passport stamps as a hobby, forwardslash spends every waking hour in virtual reality, rob05c is building a Slack service for AI, and mk is building a private Fort Knox of cryptocurrencies.
All these things cost money, and our server costs are not helping.
Thus, to feed our insatiable need for currency, we have created an annual Hubski funding goal. If you aren't viewing the site on a mobile device, you can see it on the upper right.
Currently, Hubski's server costs are $212/mo. That equates to $2544/yr. These costs are too high, and reflect an inefficiency of the Arc app. We are currently working to correct this inefficiency, and once this work is completed, we expect that out costs will drop to $116/mo, or $1392/yr.
In addition to paying for servers, we buy stickers a couple of times per year, send them to people, and typically buy a few meals, drinks, and t-shirts. We might also include occasional travel expenses in these costs, but Hubski meetups feel too much like vacations.
Hubski has always run in the red, and the money has come out of our pockets. This isn't an ideal situation, but it is a bearable one. However, there may come a time when our situation is not so bearable, and we thought it would be a good thing to be clear about where we are at.
We have set the 2016 funding goal to $2400. Assuming we can bring our server costs down as planned, $2400 should enable us to pay for our servers, and leave some money for stickers, swag, meetups, and some room for an increase in server demand.
If you donate to Hubski, you will see it reflected in our donation bar. Thanks!
As always, feedback is much appreciated!