Call for donations for Lemmy.World
2mon 8d ago by lemmy.world/u/lwadmin in lemmyworld
Calling for donations! We're running Lemmy.World for you to use for free, however the running costs aren't for free... If you appreciate our services and are willing and able to help out paying the bills, please consider a donation on one of these platforms:
- https://ko-fi.com/fhfworld- Preferred.
- https://liberapay.com/fhf
- https://opencollective.com/mastodonworld- (Either recurring or one-time donations).
- https://patreon.com/mastodonworld- (Recurring donations only)
- https://bunq.me/fhf- This is a Dutch bank account for those looking for SEPA / IBAN bank transfers
We have a blog with overview of the running costs, which is severely outdated... I will update this before the next call for donations: https://blog.mastodon.world/
I'd love to understand the costs associated with a project like this. Do you have a breakdown anywhere of where money goes each month?
We keep a blog but it's way overdue.... but the costs didn't change much so you get an idea: https://blog.mastodon.world/
Goddamn, I thought it was cheaper! I donate already to my instance and dev but I'll throw what I can your way too.
We keep a blog but it's way overdue....
Hugely understandable. It's so much rougher than people think for a small project to maintain a consistent blog. Thank you for the posts you do have!
Lemmy.world is a small project?
I was figuring someone would ask about this eventually, and I'd say: yeah. I work on Wikipedia with hundreds of thousands of active editors, millions of articles, some ungodly readership, a foundation behind us, a considerable hand in every commercial LLM on Earth, and an SEO that would make The North Face say "Yeah, I'll perform meticulous, reputation-damaging sabotage for that."
Likewise, I've worked for years on PCSX2, with a team of (I haven't counted, but) 25 or so. I don't remember because I never nosed into it, but I think we make less than Fedihosting (at €1300/mo right now for Fedihosting, that's €15,600/year). Despite currently being one of the most well-regarded emulators out there, everyone knows everyone, fuck knows nobody is turning a profit compared to the timesink, everyone is in it because they want to be there and enjoy the company and the work, and 99.9% of people on fhe street will give you a quizzical look if you point to that as a hobby – born out of not even knowing what the fuck that is.
I don't know the cost breakdown of what Fedihosting spends on servers, but I do know that there's probably not a lot of that €15,600 gross per year – if any – left over for the people (at least several; never checked) doing the hours of thankless, delicate work when your whole thing is hosting multiple social media platforms. Beyond that, the Fediverse is pretty small and certainly brings minimal glory. Usually at least some people know what PCSX2 is because they've used it. On the other hand, you need to be a very specific type to know what a "Lemmy.World" is (I wish that weren't the case).
and an SEO that would make The North Face say “Yeah, I’ll perform meticulous, reputation-damaging sabotage for that.”
Thanks, this sent me down a rabbit hole reading about the incident :D
If anyone else is interested: Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia - The North Face
Wikirabbitholes are fun
Wikirabbitholes
There needs to be a shorter configuration of that word. lol. Maybe… "wibbiholes"? or at least "wabbiholes" lol
I just meant like I thought this was the main lemmy project or something or is this just the most popular/default instance? I thought these guys built the whole lemmy ecosystem
This became the most popular instance bc Lemmy's devs run their own lemmy.ml instance with a strong tankie moderation angle, and many people don't like that.
Lemmy.ml is the instance of the lemmy creators I believe
Is that not the instance everyone hates because of their toxic politics, or something? Does that also reflect the Lemmy creators?
I don't follow the discourse myself, I just keep seeing people make derogatory references to it here and there.
Yup, the lemmy creators are straight up tankies.
I wasn't necessarily endorsing it. Just pointing the fact out to avoid confusion.
Can you promote this link to the body of the post instead of buried in a comment?
Yes I will put the link in the post later today. I am not home and am not logged in to lwadmin on the phone.
I figured it would be a decent amount. I set up a recurring payment via Patreon ages ago and I’m glad I did. My $5 USD/mo isn’t going to change the world, but I hope it helps.
5 dollar a month is amazing, that likely covers for you and hundreds of other people. Thank you!
Sorry for late comment. I think displaying some kind of goal per month could be helpful to motivate donations.
Their Open Collective page has useful information about their budget.
https://opencollective.com/mastodonworld#category-BUDGET
Perhaps it doesn't show everything, but it seems like it shows quite a lot of how their donated money flows.
It seems like that page might not be taking into account income from other platforms though; it estimates the annual budget as being €4,000, despite the official monthly budget (as listed on their Mastodon blog as of last September) being €1,700.
2€/mo. Sorry it can't be more. Thank you for all you do.
Reddit never got a cent out of me.
Done. OP please let me know yearly (i never do subscriptions but i'm willing to manually repeat yearly)
I also need to be reminded now and then,
Happy to pitch a tenner when reminded, you guys and Wikipedia.
I recommend writing a log of donations. Then you can look at where you donated, when and how much, and remind yourself of where you want to send money again.
Now, I am pretty lazy. So it's just my_donations.txt, open with Vim and whip out that calculator. Should probably be a spreadsheet instead. I don't know if Calc let's me do math based on key (place of donation).
I guess I could have separate columns per key (to maintain log nature), then do subtotal per key to specific cells, then grand total from those cells.
Still begs the question of how I would do that per year.
Sperate columns each year?
Just make range selection at the end of year?
To be honest, I never actually used any spreadsheet software. I suppose there might be some logic, if so, there sure would be a way to check the date column on same row as amount.
But anyway, Vim + calculator. 👍
I use libre Calc for my donations.
If you want to sum based on a criteria you can use sumif().
I use it to track what types of donations I make (deductible, political, etc)
I would recommend reconsidering Wikipedia (ie. the Wikimedia foundation) since they have large reserves of money and their fundraising is misleading.
Wikipedia editors even sort of had a „revolt“ against the foundation because of the misleading fundraising banners.
I'd love to donate since this is just a superior reddit imo
It's not just superior but mostly... humane... and still much more trusted to invest your finite life time into, I believe...
There's love, empathy, and reason I feel...
...not just "shadow banned" as on Reddit...
Though, I was already banned for utterly unexpected reasons at womensstuff@piefed.blahaj.zone and privacy@lemmy.ml , and though these are still not Lemmy.World, there were at least appreciated reasons stated (in the Modlog), and not just "shadow banned" as on Reddit for utterly unknown reasons with no official responses with money sent into their Vault and Awards I do regret know being shadow-banned myself...
No one cares who you are there and how much you've done for tens of years; it's an empty void and sorrow...
Regardless...
Thank you, heartfelt, dear Lemmy and PieFed Developers, Artists, Community... for the ineffably magnificent Marvel... Art you do...
Please stay safe, and I wish you success, prosperity, achievements to treasure, reach new horizons, stability... and peace...
Is there a financial summary of sorts? That outlines expenses and categories?
I was honestly pretty surprised to open this and realize the call for donations doesn't have an included transparency report.
It's probably a heavy lift, but something like that can bring considerable confidence to users who want to support you financially.
Agreed, I am more than happy to donate to keep this going if I get a summary of where the money is going 😊
There's a brief account of their finances on the linked blog post in the OP
Their blog has a break-down of their expenses from August 2025. It's about 1700€ per month, mostly for server-related costs.
I have now paid for shitposts thank you for your service
I don't like how I think of someone when I hear "Thank you for your"
I don’t know how I feel about someone whose mom prefers me to stay “through breakfast.”
Can't donate money but are you still looking for
– Technical / infra people , for helping run all the instances and plan for the future. (We use linux/docker/terraform/ansible, so either you need to know about them, or want to learn about them).
Yes we are, can you contact me at info@fedihosting.foundation about this?
Sure! It'll be a tuta mail address. What timezone are y'all targeting for collab?
Most of the team is EU and US at the moment. But we can use help from all timezones
Hey, are you still looking for moderators at Lemmy, or are you covered? Interested, because It could be another way to help.
I threw in 10 American flavored euros. Hope it helps!
Pssshh I donated but I'm not gonna make a comment about it
Just gave a €30 dono. I get way more value out of my Lemmy account than that. Thanks for all you do to provide an alternative to big tech
Just upgraded to Tier 3 for monthly donations. Thank you for all you do!
Is the foundation's BUNQ account still active? I have a recurring bank transfer pointed at it and I just want to make sure I'm not throwing money into a black hole. That's the NL78 BUNQ 2108 3219 85 account.
If it's still active, maybe consider putting it in the post? I'm sure direct bank transfers could save the foundation on processing fees.
Yes this is the one at https://bunq.me/fhf,I added it to the post
It is!
T3 member since March 2025.
Have stopped a subscription I don't have a use for anymore so I'll jump on your ko-fi at the end of this month as the replacement for that. Absolutely deserved, hope you get all that's needed! (Does ko-fi have reoccurring payments? Haven't used it before, and I'd like to have an automatic monthly donation)
Yes, I make a recurring monthly donation via ko-fi.
Threw in a small recurring donation on Kofi. Thanks for your hard work. :D
I've been donating monthly for almost 3 years, and I'm gonna doubble my donation amount! (1€ -> 2€)
very nice 😎😎😎
Done!
Thank you for hosting Lemmy.World :3
Can't I just set up a SEPA transfer? Is NL78 BUNQ 2108 3219 85 your IBAN?
Yes it is, or use https://bunq.me/fhf
That's where I got the IBAN from. You link this in your sidebar but not this post.
Maybe a stupid question but how would be Ko-Fi preferable to a simple recurring SEPA transfer to anybody in the SEPA region? Bank to bank is as straightforward as it gets, never any fees,...
Good point. Will update the post and remember for upcoming donation posts
Does using KoFi make accounting easier for you compared to direct transfer? Otherwise I'd highly recommend putting that bunq.me link way up there as well.
Just wired €10 🍀
Any options to pay in crypto?
Only Ada at the moment addr1qyacucygjuc8lnnk76vxax6wejghhlvkq4t6cs0mxx49drwxef63ye5wqjeu2pd0afj8ytz2ty24rgzq96mlfyhdxdwq9xr45u
Unfortunately my crypto wallet don't support transfers to this currency.
Monthly donor here. Appreciate you guys.
I just signed up for a €7/mo recurring. I used to buy reddit gold, but now I'm here on Lemmy, so thank you for putting the call out there. And the only reason I mention the amount and post this comment is to encourage others to donate as well. Especially a recurring amount.
You just made me sign up as monthly now as well.
Fuckin' awesome! <3
Nah man, you are the awsome here leading the way!
Done. 20€ and lots of appreciation.
Donated, keep it going please!
Donated, thanks
Donated
Done! Thanks for the reminder. $25 US sent your way.
Done
i am trying to donate but it requires me to enter email, how to bypass this.
Just give it a bullshit email address if you don't want a receipt.
done thanks.
Cheers, done
FYI You can embed it like this:
Thanks!
I support a bunch of creators on Patreon, so have added you guys too. Thanks for being awesome.
I'll donate $100 when you guys finally ban JordanLund for breaking so many rules as an power mod with at least 3 warnings from the admins to stop.
Sent 20 bucks - thanks a lot and lots of love to you!
Just did my x amount donation. Go Lemmy ,!!
Done. Thanks.
donated. thank you for hosting
Paypal?
In the instance panel (on the right side,) it shows the following ways you can donate. Paypal isn't listed.
Most if not all of the donation services allow you to use Paypal though. Ko-Fi does for sure.
Bring back NSFW and I will
Is NSFW stuff blocked on here?
No
That's what https://fedinsfw.app/ is for.
Shitbag
What? Can't you just visit other specialized instances for it?
Done!
Can you add a SEPA number to your post? I have zero interest in handing my account information to some middleman. Or in paying a random middleman, even, for that "service".
https://bunq.me/fhfWill edit the post later today
Thanks, donated
For some reason I couldn't remember "IBAN" 😀
I can't donate to an instance that let zionism thrive.
I'm doing my part!
I last donated like 13 months ago, so it's time to renew. Just remind me again in 12-13 months from now.
I give monthly
D O N A T E D
I was going to donate $5 per month, but I had second thoughts after seeing the profile picture on the donation site. I probably will still donate eventually, but I am not comfortable supporting an openly biased platform.
...I'm new. I'll probably donate. I just need to make sure censoring people for different opinions isnt as common as it originally seemed. The fact that I was already banned from one of the most popular communities isn't a good sign.
If those mods are the people that would receive the donations, then I don't think they would use it for anything good...just a better funded echo chamber.
Can you explain? What picture, and biased how?
what offending picture are you even talking about? what "echo chamber"? what are you on about?
OP got banned from the US news community because they made some pretty controversial statements and (from their personal PoV) questioned if MAGA cult followers exist. That's the only community on LW they got banned from, cited as being for "rage baiting / trolling", which yeah it very well could be, even with a benefit of doubt.
But that's hardly an echo chamber. It's just one community, and moderators are typically completely unaffiliated with the server and can pick and enforce their own rules, nothing stops them from making or joining another US news comm. They even boasted that blocking that comm made their feed better, so it's not like they wanted to be there either.
Which picture? They all look pretty innocuous to me... Maybe I'm out of the loop on something?
Are you sure you weren't looking at some patron's profile? As far as I can tell the .world profile pics are just blue and green letters or a lemmy logo.
What donation site? All the links posted here just show the mastodon.world logo, which is just a lemmy logo shaped planet on one and a speech bubble shaped planet on the others...
I didn't use this post. It was a week ago I clicked on the link on the top screen that said "donate to Lemmy.". I don't know exactly who the picture was, but I could recognize it as a left-wing revolutionary. It was that Spanish dude with a beard...Chavez I think. The picture was on Patreon and I think Librapay.
I'm not necessarily against him or left wing revolutionaries, but it felt like something the mods on News would use. After I thought about, I realized that whoever set up this instance probably controls the popular left wing communities. I would if I set up a website.
I don't know the history of the person in the picture, but it's commonly used by extremists. If I see that profile picture on Reddit, it means I'm about to read a comment from someone who thinks Bernie Sanders is a far-right capitalist.
i need some encouragement. if you were to display ads, but the only ad was to donate to get rid of the ads, i would do it.
no.
Nobody is forcing you to pay. Nobody is forcing you to be an ass, either.
i dunno maybe if the admins... oh wait they told me i'd be banned if i publicized their little whatsit so nevermind.
such mystery!
