ether+nick

@timbray Right. If revenue is only 0.5% of expenses, or even 5%, there's no way that unit economics can be tuned to make a profit. But if it's 50%, say, I think the traditional VC idea is to keep funding it, and then make it pay well in the future. I don't know if those percentages are anywhere near accurate, btw.

@stefan @andypiper I meant, can we live with me leaving it on this poll? Actually, I shouldn't ask; I really rarely change polls once they've started.

@evan

I mean, I can definitely live with it. I just wonder if it's an additional concept that will need to be explained when talking about the fediverse with a more general audience.

I feel like I'd probably be saying "instance, also called server" a lot, same as when I sometimes say "Mastodon and the larger fediverse".

Although, admittedly, I'm relying on personal and other anecdotal experience when I assume that less techy people are familiar with "servers". (Eg. Discord using the term, my own conversations at work with non-developers, etc.)

@andypiper

@timbray So, if it's real value that people are willing to pay for, is it a bubble? Or a business?

I guess if software developers are paying enough that investors think it's interesting, but not enough to pay the expenses, and not by a large margin, that's probably a bubble.