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The first two aren't technically possible. And also not desirable, IMHO. That said, [name redacted] can import pageviews from logfiles like goaccess, so that's kind of the closest you can get (although then it's harder to filter bots, so it's more skewed the other way).

That said, I do wish tools like uBlock would make it easier to give people more choice in what to block and not block, but that's not up to me (also in terms of ads; the other day I saw a site which has just <img src="/ad.png">, which I don't really see any problem with, and uBlock goes out of its way to block that – meh).

There are really two types of "marketing":

- "Hey, here's something interesting you might be interested in!"

- "Drink Coca Cola"

The second type of marketing is the sort of zero-sum game you're talking about. Everyone already knows about this, Coca Cola and Pepsi spend phenomenal amounts of money, and it kind of just cancels out.

But the first type of marketing is rather different. The simplest kind is making something and then telling people that you made it.

> Plausible also has a co-founder who does marketing, and is evidently very good at it. That's perhaps a more important factor in success than simply offering a paid plan.

Yes, I agree. This is also what I told the NLnet people a few years back, but while there's a lot of budget for specific technical things, there isn't really any money set aside for more "soft" aspects like this.

I don't dislike Jimmy Wales. "Please donate to Wikipedia" is one of the most common "please donate" type messages, and at least in the past it was usually written from the first person with a picture of Jimmy Wales' (usually unshaven) mug. It's just a joke. Nothing more.

The infra costs are covered, with some to spare; that's not really the problem. It's more "I have this thing anyway, so might as well ask people using it for some help now I really need it." That's why it's in the release notes (never expected it to be posted here).

Well, there's a long chain of events over the last ~3 years leading up to this point, but I don't really feel like explaining everything in detail (and I don't think it's all that interesting in the first place). Also I never made that much in software dev in the first place.

[name redacted] started a few months before Plausible.

Giving it away for free didn't help, but "making money" was never really a goal as such. I think "being free" is important if you want to be a viable alternative for Google Analytics. €9/month is nothing for a business, but who is paying that for a blog or hobby site (or even some small businesses)?

I already decided a few years ago that "covers hosting" is good enough. It's just that circumstances conspired to put in this rather uncomfortable position.

Thanks everyone!

I should have updated this last week as I had raised enough money and I'm starting a job next Monday. So things should be grand going forward for now.