Ask HN: Can HN be monetized?

[doronrotem]

I have no idea if HN is monetized or not, and I mean directly, not by just creating community around YC. I am wodering if it could be monetized. according to google trends the ycombinator domain has around 50K daily uniques. if all of this traffic arrives to HN I can guess it means 3M page views a momth. Assuming someone will try to monetized using CPC ads, with a ratio of click per 1K, assuming $1 per click this will lead to the modest $3000/mo. not that impressive I think (assuming this is a main income for a company and not a side project of some hacker who has a day job).

what do you think?

[mathattack]

It gets monetized indirectly. Ycomb gets first look for many firms, and these firms get first look at many great developers. This site is plenty monetized - just not with ads or user fees.

[arn]

like others have said, directly monetizing HN isn't really in line with the goals of the site.

But, an easy way to monetize it if you were looking would probably be a paid job board. Given the audience, it would be easy to charge a lot per listing.

also, your stats are way off, as of April: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2401131

[dustingetz]

Hn is like gmail. Not a direct profit center, but a strategic asset of great value.

[Mz]

My understanding is it is not monetized and already has a business purpose. As I understand it, monetizing it could potentially interfere with the existing business purpose. I've seen a smidgeon of discussion about this previously but cannot find it.

For some things of value, charging money (more) directly is a good way to kill the goose laying the golden egg. This is a concept I have struggled with for many years, but from the opposite side of the fence: How to make money when I know it to be true that charging directly would be a major fail, a case of "you can't get there from here". I don't have answers in that regard for my projects (and thus I don't have money). Presumably, pg (who does have money) and whomever else makes decisions about such things are not idiots about such details, so I am thinking it likely won't be monetized (at least not in the way you suggest -- as another person suggested, in some sense it already is since it plays a role in their business strategy).

[hendrix]

I use HN specifically because it is NOT monetized. If I wanted monetized I'd go to reddit/digg/facebook/tumblr.