[HCoop-Help] Commercial Site for Others / Non-member

[Michal]

On Mon, Apr 13, 2009 at 6:22 PM, Adam Chlipala <adamc at hcoop.net> wrote:
> That's also my understanding of our present de-facto policy.  I've been
> griping about this policy for a while, as I think members should need to
> pay extra to resell any aspect of our services that would usually be

Personally, I am in two minds about this.

One the one hand, as in my previous message, I feel it's fair to not
give back a bit of the profits you make from HCoop, especially if more
resources are being used.

On the other hand, enforcing such a rule might make HCoop too much
like a business. Right now it very much feels like an organization
whose goals are not to make money. I don't want to abuse it's
services, say to use all the diskspace/bandwidth that I possibly can.
For example the wording on the front page gives non-specific
diskspace/bandwith guidelines. This does make me consider other people
using/running HCoop. I'm not going to go running intensive things on
the server just because I can. I also like the non-fixed pledging:
giving what I can afford / feels right.

If fixed rules are set for payment for a commercial service, then it
could ruin this. Personally, once I feel I have 'bought' something, I
tend to feel I can use it how I want without consideration to others.
Once this line is crossed into making HCoop seem like a business, I
think it would be hard to go back.

What about a middle ground? Keeping no fixed rules for commercial
sites for 3rd parties, but maybe specifying that 'Members are
encouraged to increase pledges for commercial sites if they can afford
to do so'...?

(By the way, some of my thinking I have blatantly stolen from a book
I'm reading 'Predictably Irrational, Chapter 4: "The Cost of Social
Norms", which I recommend, especially to people setting up businesses
and/or organisations!)

Michal.