I think the concept of “Pay what you want.” is a very friendly approach to this. It already exists on platforms like itch.io and some free to play games financed through donations, like Dwarf Fortress, also became extremely popular. Humble Bundles are also pretty famous for this. And of course kickstarters do something a bit similar to this.
Personally I’d love to see donation buttons/infos especially for all the free music and games that exist out there. But I want to make sure my donations reach the people who actually worked on it, so I dislike products like paypal or patreon where a portion of the money goes to men in the middle and their managers/owners, etc. A bank account number or something along those lines where I can transfer money a bit more directly would be nice, but some creators only provide paypal buttons, so I won’t donate.
He’s not talking about donations though, he’s talking about paying full price THEN tipping. It’s a blatant excuse to pay developers less while placing financial guilt on the people paying for the product. It’s the same way tipping at a restaurant works.
He’s not talking about donations though, he’s talking about paying full price THEN tipping.
I’m aware of that. The “Pay what you want.” concept mentioned in my first paragraph was its own idea/suggestion/thought, since it kinda fits the topic. It’s a different thing.
It’s a blatant excuse to pay developers less while placing financial guilt on the people paying for the product. It’s the same way tipping at a restaurant works.
Not really, really good video games take months or even years to complete, so your developers will want to be paid for that time before they become profitable. At restaurants the initial investment isn’t quite as high, as far as wages are concerned. I’d argue that you get tipped before even getting your first monthly paycheck. That can not be the case for video game tips.
I assume software developers and other people in the IT sector are also in higher demand than waiters, so they don’t have it quite as bad as waiters. That’s why I think they’re not comparable.
That said, I do believe that a company that is open about the tips it receives could be interesting for developers. If I saw that tips were actually split evenly among all the employees and their work hours then I think it’d be worth considering applying there. Though I guess for fairness those tips should even be paid out if employees quit or get kicked out so you’d have to track how much each person contributed to each product and that could be a bit of a bureaucratic hassle.
I think the concept of “Pay what you want.” is a very friendly approach to this. It already exists on platforms like itch.io and some free to play games financed through donations, like Dwarf Fortress, also became extremely popular. Humble Bundles are also pretty famous for this. And of course kickstarters do something a bit similar to this.
Personally I’d love to see donation buttons/infos especially for all the free music and games that exist out there. But I want to make sure my donations reach the people who actually worked on it, so I dislike products like paypal or patreon where a portion of the money goes to men in the middle and their managers/owners, etc. A bank account number or something along those lines where I can transfer money a bit more directly would be nice, but some creators only provide paypal buttons, so I won’t donate.
He’s not talking about donations though, he’s talking about paying full price THEN tipping. It’s a blatant excuse to pay developers less while placing financial guilt on the people paying for the product. It’s the same way tipping at a restaurant works.
Worse, since if you tip through the game you’re almost certainly just giving that money to the execs
Like they said, exactly like tipping at a restaurant.
That’s where work contracts can help. Any form of tipping and how it is split would have to be handled by a contract anyway.
I’m aware of that. The “Pay what you want.” concept mentioned in my first paragraph was its own idea/suggestion/thought, since it kinda fits the topic. It’s a different thing.
Not really, really good video games take months or even years to complete, so your developers will want to be paid for that time before they become profitable. At restaurants the initial investment isn’t quite as high, as far as wages are concerned. I’d argue that you get tipped before even getting your first monthly paycheck. That can not be the case for video game tips.
I assume software developers and other people in the IT sector are also in higher demand than waiters, so they don’t have it quite as bad as waiters. That’s why I think they’re not comparable.
That said, I do believe that a company that is open about the tips it receives could be interesting for developers. If I saw that tips were actually split evenly among all the employees and their work hours then I think it’d be worth considering applying there. Though I guess for fairness those tips should even be paid out if employees quit or get kicked out so you’d have to track how much each person contributed to each product and that could be a bit of a bureaucratic hassle.