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Tell HN: I've rejected $1.4M offer to work on open-source instead

17 points by coconutbrain ↗ HN
I've been offered $1.4M (over 4-years) for a senior technical role in a Series-B funded startup

F*ck them!

I'm not slaving away A SECOND of my time to build next capitalist ponzi-bubble

I won't let these bastards become billionaires off my back

What, you're a billion dollar company already? With only 10 clients?

You need growth? What for? To lure in more investors and ride up/justify your crazy valuation?

I'd like to my spend next year contributing to open-source

30 comments

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tighter_wires
What will you do for income while working on OS?
coconutbrain
I don't worry much about it. I can go back to corporate slavery any time. In fact there's massive labor shortage

Open-Source brings many more opportunities as a side-effect. Especially networking, eg. "I saw this guy on on GitHub/HackerNews, can we hire him?"

Actually, they stumbled upon my GitHub project and that's how they found out about me in the first place

opendomain
I am the founder of OpenDomain - I have given domains worth millions to open source for more than 20 years. And I got to tell you - no one appreciates it.

I own the domain web3.net - I was originally hoping to let someone use it to promote web3, but now I am considering just selling it.

coconutbrain
I donated at least 3 domain names to open-source projects

Don't hold on to the domains, I'd suggest donating money directly to the contributors

seoaeu
Sell/auction the domain, and donate the proceeds to a food bank? They'd surely be more than grateful for it
gus_massa
Cash or pie in the sky equity?

How many hours per week? Holidays?

If this makes you happy and you have enough savings, it fine.

But other people may need to work for the salary, or even think that the problem they are solving is interesting, and that's fine too.

coconutbrain
A higher than average salary + Tons of stock options

My mind is made-up and no million can change this

I'd rather die tomorrow than contribute a single line of code to a Venture-Funded startup (I know HN billionaire-wannabes would disagree)

helsinki
Right there with you. Never again. Fuck that.
Minor49er
If you don't want the job, I'll take it
coconutbrain
You value money over mental health?
yannoninator
yes, food requires money. i have nothing to lose really.
coconutbrain
Good thing those Silicon Valley Ponzi-schemes, aka. "Startups" are not the only way to make money!
CogitoCogito
Maybe it wouldn’t induce mental health issues for everyone?
Minor49er
No, because after four years, I'd retire and live the rest of my life doing whatever I wanted whenever I wanted, starting my own projects on my own time to make any extra money or to simply satisfy my own interests.
coconutbrain
You know the risks? What if things go south and your options are worth zero?

90% of startups fail

Minor49er
That's why you do research beforehand about the company, the market, the product/service, and the people who are going to drive it forward. If those things together give you confidence in what the company is trying to do and their ability to achieve it, then you are taking what's called a "calculated risk" when you join them.

Existing companies also fail. You take similar risks when you join one of those as well.

ipaddr
You didn't say you were giving away a lottery ticket for open source. How much of the 350 is salary?

Somewhere between 170 and 225 is my guess. Still a lot of money but after taxes it's nowhere near retirement after 4 years. The stock could be worth something or nothing.. unless they are public or liquid I would discount that amount by 90%.

coconutbrain
> You didn't say you were giving away a lottery ticket for open source

You call this a lottery ticket? My open-source work is the reason they were considering me in the first place!

Instead of getting opportunities, let them establish a monopoly over my time? No, thanks

> after taxes it's nowhere near retirement after 4 years

Correct, if you take the taxes into account there's more grind for what's worth

Those stock options are effectively $0, but based on the company's crazy valuation, sure they might be calculated as that much

Minor49er
That salary is roughly $900,000, post-tax. If you couldn't retire off of that today, let alone use that money to live comfortably for a substantial amount of time, then I simply don't know what to tell you
muzani
I'm probably missing some context here, because I have a well paid job and it makes me happy.
TigeriusKirk
Yes, don't let them become billionaires off your back. Contribute to open source projects like Linux where they can't do that.
coconutbrain
Many linux developers are employed. They're getting paid for doing open-source
Minor49er
They're employed by people who want them to make specific changes that drive their own interests, which are often for-profit (hence why they have the funds available to pay someone to make changes to open source)
Minor49er
This reminds me of the scene in Antitrust where Milo, the young computer scientist, meets Gary Winston, the Bill Gates / Steve Jobs figure, for the first time. Milo is set on contributing to open source, saying it will do the world good, but Gary asks him, "How many will be altruistic (with what you do for free), and how many will make billions off of your generosity?"
yannoninator
> Contribute to open source projects like Linux where they can't do that.

The Linux Foundation 2021 annual report [0] forecasts revenues of over $177M and companies are still involved in the development of Linux and other open source projects under that umbrella.

Either way, Linux devs and other open source devs are being "supported" by these big corporations.

[0] https://www.linuxfoundation.org/tools/linux-foundation-annua...

tru3_power
At the end of the day what are these open source projects you contribute to used for? You could very well be helping out the exact same parties.
coconutbrain
This is true!

However, there are startups around like Ghost, Matrix, who are doing all work in open-source

Also when you license under GNU, those parasites are scared off rather quickly

The truth reason more startups don't that, because they have no leverage, besides the code and/or want to protect their moat at all costs, so they can brag about "we own the IP" when investors are asking "What makes your offering uniquely possible?"

Luckily, as serial™ (co)founder i know the game well enough and never went beyond a seed-round

errcorrectcode
I think you made a colossal error in long-term judgement.

That's what work is. Making money to live on. Everyone has to figure out a way to earn their bread. If you can earn a large pile in a 2-10 year burst of effort, hopefully not at unsustainable, perpetual crash program-effort, that's great. If not, feel free to work as long as you can until you can't. There is no reward or award for hard work, only captured value of results.

I tried the whole "purity in obscurity" vanlife thing. You still need money to live, and living comfortably is much better than cutting off your nose to spite your face in obscene austerity.

I forfeited $6 megabucks and regret it because it only required enduring a thick-headed buffoon for a few years.