[database_lost]

"... and actually drives everyone to compete in how much they can contribute" - because this is what we all need, competing everyday for making someone else more money. Also, this model seems to work reallly well for you: none of the top navigation buttons on your site work for me (using Chrome beta)

[EGreg]

This is an entirely voluntary option. Someone like patio11 advocates it all the time. (It was partly inspired by his writings.) It was supposed to address the arbitrage that the middlemen take when they rent out your skills to effect real change, while they stick you in a “steady” paycheck situation and give you bundled health insurance.

You want to be underpaid in a full time job and pretend to work 8 hours a day, while your time is billed out at 3x by a consulting company? Have at it. Or you can think about how much value you are bringing to the business and get a cut of that value. No one at Qbix is FORCED to accept such an arrangement. However, people have chosen to do it voluntarily, and it is a way to be properly compensated fairly for just how much you helped grow the software company’s bottom line.

Imagine, as a developer or designer, coming across a SaaS company whose product you are very familiar with, that openly publishes its metrics. They honestly reveal that some metrics could use improvement, and you have a great idea for how to do it. You get in touch and – instead of hiring you to for some full-time position doing mostly drudge work inside the company – they agree to pay you for your contribution, if it works out. $1,000,000 / year x (C–1) for every factor C that you improve a certain KPI metric.

PS: Those aren’t buttons, they are menus, you’re supposed to use the dropdown.

[database_lost]

"compensated fairly for just how much you helped grow the software company’s bottom line" - as others have said: what do you do with all the stuff below the waterline, that DON'T grow the bottom line? Bugfixing, reliability, privacy, security, etc.

PS: Thanks, knew that, the dropdown buttons didn't work. And they still don't.

[EGreg]

We pay for it as any company does — internally. All contributions go through the same process. Just the initiatives that can raise our bottom line get tested and compensated proportionally if that’s what the submitter chooses!

PS: What OS and browser?