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1. Alright, What's all this
then? [1] A. Iter8r is a social bookmarking website that enables users to:
Iter8r Inc. is an open company that engages with its user community at all levels- from content-generation to profit-sharing, from source code to financial information, from infrastructure to governance and everything in between. The concept is described in detail here. |
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2. Profit-sharing. What you talkin'
about, Willis? [2] A. In simple terms:
The Ratios: Initially, the community collectively keeps 58% of the profits earned, an additional 10% of the profits go towards supporting Free Software Projects and the founders keep 32% of the profits. The Trigger Event: Upon reaching 80,000 qualified users, the community's share increases by 4% each year (the founders' share decreases by an equivalent amount). The Cooperative: 8 years after the Trigger Event, the founders' share reaches 0 and the company will be converted to a non-loss cooperative. It will then be governed by a board of directors nominated and elected by the user and developer community. In graphical terms:  |
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3. You're not serious, are you? A. Oh, but we are! We think that it is possible to create an open, equitable and cooperative organization based on a community of contributing users and developers. We the founders have introduced the Iter8r concept and provided the broad framework. We are looking to the community to take it from here. |
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4. How will profits be distributed at an individual level? A. We have designed profit sharing to be fair. However, it needs more experimentation and modeling. We are open to any ideas you may have. Please note that your contribution must first be placed in the public domain for us to consider adopting it. Here are the criteria for alternate profit-sharing mechanisms:
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5. Why are posts and votes limited per hour? A. Iter8r places reasonable limits on the number of contributions per user per hour. This is done in order to:
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6. What's this I hear about "Select Lists"? A. The Select List is a simple mechanism that ensures that articles have been voted on fairly and judiciously. Users who vote on articles from their Select List which then go on to become popular, score additional points. Reading the articles in a given Select List, weighing their quality and then deciding to vote takes more effort than simply voting on popular articles. Hence the additional points. To sum up, users earn rewards for voting on (thereby filtering and sorting) articles. The rewards are much higher when voting from Select Lists. |
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7. What about moderation? A. Good question. Please use Iter8r responsibly. Iter8r Guidelines:
We like Hacker News guidelines [3]. We urge you to adopt them. |
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8. What about adblock? A. Kurt Vonnegut never said, "But trust me on the sunblock" [4] and we wouldn't presume to tell you what to do with sunblock or adblock for that matter. We will be glad to have you as a user and/or a developer. |
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9. Do you think this will work? A. We don't know, but let's ask 80,000 of your friends! |
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10. I am not a US resident. Can I donate my share to charity? A. Certainly! Rewards accumulated by non-US resident users will be pooled and held in a separate account. If you are not a US resident, you can donate the rewards to a 501(c)(3) charity of your choice. |
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11. But ... should I wait? Is there more? [5] A. Yes! Profit-sharing aside, we hope that you like the Iter8r concept enough to adopt it. If you don't like it, let us know and we promise we'll try and fix it. We would like your help to:
We pledge to:
We would love to hear from you. You can reach us here. |
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12. Great! How do I get started? A. Currently Iter8r (beta) is open by invitation only. If you do not receive an invitation from your friends, you can use this contact form to request one and we will send you one as we scale up the service. |
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References [1] Alright, What's all this then? [2] What you talkin' about, Willis? [3] Hacker News Guidelines [4] But trust me on the sunscreen [5] But Wait! There's More |
