Donation is volunteering past effort, as an exchange for present effort, often because they are two different types of effort and you only can perform the former.
Someone who can perform the latter, themselves, can simply volunteer the effort directly.
The reason why people usually prefer to donate to funds, rather than to people already volunteering their labor, is to expand the market for the labor to include the people who would not perform the effort (or continue to perform it) without payment.
But that's also why the things produced by the volunteers directly are sometimes of higher-quality and more sustainable. They are conscious of the running costs going forward, and the continued pain of the effort over time, as they are putting in the effort themselves.
You don't scoff at software being buggy, when you know that you're going to be the moron sitting there, in 4 months, on a Saturday evening, trying to fix the bugs. You can't just laugh and say, Oh, I'll just hire some mercenaries to slay that dragon, cost what it will. You're the mercenary. Go slay.
Laeserin
npub1m4…jc2jl
2025-05-06 07:18:52
in reply to nevent1q…7l7m
Author Public Key
npub1m4ny6hjqzepn4rxknuq94c2gpqzr29ufkkw7ttcxyak7v43n6vvsajc2jlPublished at
2025-05-06 07:18:52Event JSON
{
"id": "775e6eac2c0fdfffc814819fb2b33871cbd75b47e0b42a4d31ff563c5e649336",
"pubkey": "dd664d5e4016433a8cd69f005ae1480804351789b59de5af06276de65633d319",
"created_at": 1746515932,
"kind": 1,
"tags": [
[
"e",
"a4c4f9b76dded5ee69345fa5dea95fb97062626a367ed9ebdd2309b21cdca2b7",
"wss://theforest.nostr1.com/",
"root",
"fea186c2a4678dbc437704eed2160846e8a781e5fb17056e9bb333840d5bdef2"
],
[
"e",
"ebf0846140de408e9afd00984f5b3102152a8f36f1e9e5f00d88fa954824174b",
"wss://nostr.mom/",
"reply",
"dd664d5e4016433a8cd69f005ae1480804351789b59de5af06276de65633d319"
],
[
"p",
"fea186c2a4678dbc437704eed2160846e8a781e5fb17056e9bb333840d5bdef2"
],
[
"p",
"aa902c06496dd51e22521ed77aa9f8b1edcaab329b439990e369411f6b490e71"
]
],
"content": "Donation is volunteering past effort, as an exchange for present effort, often because they are two different types of effort and you only can perform the former.\nSomeone who can perform the latter, themselves, can simply volunteer the effort directly.\n\nThe reason why people usually prefer to donate to funds, rather than to people already volunteering their labor, is to expand the market for the labor to include the people who would not perform the effort (or continue to perform it) without payment.\n\nBut that's also why the things produced by the volunteers directly are sometimes of higher-quality and more sustainable. They are conscious of the running costs going forward, and the continued pain of the effort over time, as they are putting in the effort themselves.\n\nYou don't scoff at software being buggy, when you know that you're going to be the moron sitting there, in 4 months, on a Saturday evening, trying to fix the bugs. You can't just laugh and say, Oh, I'll just hire some mercenaries to slay that dragon, cost what it will. You're the mercenary. Go slay.",
"sig": "a895e18f18dff85d25195cfd222dd30b7cb4a2fde86e0c006b0250325de4a1f1646ef183b9881f5f201df29ad453fba84a251f56bd2b9b121fe6866450c5cf2e"
}