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Tell HN: The Python Software Foundation is now showing banner ads

9•inesranzo•2d ago
I was looking for a Python package and saw this Wikipedia-esque banner ad jump scare me out of nowhere.

https://postimg.cc/6ykTmSPD

I don't understand why the PSF is begging me to donate by showing an intrusive (and borderline manipulative) banner ad disrupting my reading flow.

If this was supposed to be the "point", it has made even more less likely to give money to support them.

I understand that sponsors are needed and the PSF have already been paid massively for this with their many PSF sponsors. Because of these generous sponsorships from these companies that use Python, you wouldn't need donations from me.

I just wish we can stop the enshittification of almost everything by polluting the web with ads.

Comments

bothat•2d ago
I think the goal of the foundation is to diversity the sponsors so that that don't have to rely on big corporation. Who can cut spending when they miss a target.
arunabha•2d ago
I am not sure I follow your reasoning. You're complaining about a request for donation, on a site which provides a language and supporting infrastructure like a package manager for free?

Why shouldn't the PSF be allowed to ask for donations on their site? I'm sure if you're unhappy with them, they will cheerfully refund you the price you paid?

Oh!, that's right, you paid nothing and you claim that asking for donations is somehow 'enshittification' of PSF.

Frankly, the level of entitlement in your post is something else.

monerozcash•2d ago
It might be easy to criticize the wikipedia banners given how most of the money gets spent, but is the same true here? I suspect not.
ferrouswheel•2d ago
Yikes that is definitely a sloppy ad.

I have no problem with a reasonable request. But this is definitely enshittification territory.

Sigh, we can have nothing good anymore.

ferrouswheel•2d ago
[flagged]
cyanydeez•2d ago
[flagged]
tomhow•1d ago
Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. Eventually we have to ban accounts that keep posting like this.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

tomhow•1d ago
Please don’t introduce off-topic flame bait on HN. The guidelines make it clear we're aiming for something better here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46255900 and marked it off topic.

ferrouswheel•1d ago
It was relevant due to Python Foundation having to reject what used to be regular government funding because they started adding ideological clauses to it.
tomhow•21h ago
Fair enough but on HN we’re here for curious conversation not political/ideological battle. It’s fine to raise the topic as a point of fact, but the flamebait is gratuitous and takes it well into guidelines-breaking territory.
camdenreslink•2d ago
That’s not really what I think of when I think of “banner ads”. Clickbait title imo.
zahlman•2d ago
> I don't understand why the PSF is begging me to donate by showing an intrusive (and borderline manipulative) banner ad disrupting my reading flow.

Putting aside matters of real-world politics and "culture war", my main objection to the PSF is their funding allocation. Almost all core developers are volunteering (aside from a couple of "developer-in-residence" positions; we're talking about on the order of a hundred volunteers here), and presumably not all of them have high-paying day jobs at major tech companies (although certainly a lot of the more easily recognized names do). Many more administrative staff are paid, not obscenely much but certainly more than zero.

And then the lion's share of the rest of the budget goes to operating PyCon US. I guess (reviewing the financial reports) this is profitable for them, given that their "operating service revenue" must be pretty close to 100% from that. But it's hard for me to imagine why people would pay those prices to see talks that will later be available on YouTube (and which could almost universally do with a lot of editing) unless they're really there to meet people in person. Meanwhile other meetups worldwide get a pittance in support. I know that there are grants awarded specifically to enable the less privileged to attend PyCon, but the whole thing still strikes me as rather elitist.

But on the other hand, I do sympathize with the Python project (not so much the Foundation) being severely underfunded for what it is. When I see the Wikipedia banners I'm disgusted because I know the Wikimedia Foundation is already, by non-profit "do good things on the Internet" foundation standards, absolutely drowning in cash. But the PSF's existing dues and contributions wouldn't even cover the costs of the "Packaging Work Group / Infrastructure / Other" category in the 2024 breakdown. And that is without considering Fastly's generous in-kind donation of bandwidth (which AIUI is in the exabyte/year range now). The PSF really have not "been paid massively", notwithstanding estimates of the value of that in-kind donation. You can see the numbers for yourself (https://www.python.org/psf/annual-report/2024/).

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