I can see the logic but I’d suspect the payments for meetings would need to be quite low in most instances as I wonder whether you create weird incentives where time strapped high-in-demand people slap high fees on meetings and people who have limited funds have yet another barrier to meeting such people. Could also make some very moral conscious people maximise the charge they put on the meeting slot given the time:cost benefit is now not just their own time, but also the opportunity cost of what someone else was willing to pay.
How do you see mitigating the risk that it’ll no longer just be your idea that gets you through the door, but the depth of your pockets?
Separately, am I correct that there is no funds to create the MVP? It feels like something which a few thousand £/$’s could build from a reputable programmer? Would that be useful and possible to get the concept off the ground and able to be tested?
Would valuable connections that otherwise be made be precluded because they are behind big paywalls? Or would such connections never have happened (or have been more costly in other terms) in the first place? My intuition is that those who would put a large donation cost behind their time would be those who) for whom it would be difficult already to obtain an introduction. I think that if others make introductions, which is often how traditional networking happens, it seems rather gauche for one to also impose the charitable paywall.
Further, I’d hope that HMO could augment traditionalist networking, perhaps by enabling initial inroads into networks, incurring an initial cost for a way into a chain in which the next steps don’t have financial costs.
I am also less concerned because the Listeners isn’t personally benefiting from the paywall and this makes me less concerned that they would choose to forgo promising conversations. Again, there definitely is the concern, however.
And you’re right, currently no funds. Some seed money would definitely be helpful for development.
You raise an important potential downside. It was already hard for people with shallow pockets to reach people with deep pockets and this might make it harder.
For me personally, I would do the following. Someone cold calls or emails me. If this is an aspiring entrepreneur who has no deep pockets and a good pitch, I will meet with them for free. Same for any NGO or individual making the world a better place. If this is a for-profit company that has X profits I will charge a Y amount that I think is fair for that company to pay me for my time, through a donation to an effective charity. If facebook wants my time I will charge a million.
There’s pros and cons to everything, but the additional money flowing to charities seems more important to me, but we should think of ways for people who can’t afford donations to not be excluded. Replying with your HearMeOut link depending on who cold emails or calls you seems like a simple but effective solution, at least for me, but I’m curious to hear what others think!
A unique and interesting concept.
I can see the logic but I’d suspect the payments for meetings would need to be quite low in most instances as I wonder whether you create weird incentives where time strapped high-in-demand people slap high fees on meetings and people who have limited funds have yet another barrier to meeting such people. Could also make some very moral conscious people maximise the charge they put on the meeting slot given the time:cost benefit is now not just their own time, but also the opportunity cost of what someone else was willing to pay.
How do you see mitigating the risk that it’ll no longer just be your idea that gets you through the door, but the depth of your pockets?
Separately, am I correct that there is no funds to create the MVP? It feels like something which a few thousand £/$’s could build from a reputable programmer? Would that be useful and possible to get the concept off the ground and able to be tested?
Thanks James.
I’m also concerned about the counterfactual...
Would valuable connections that otherwise be made be precluded because they are behind big paywalls? Or would such connections never have happened (or have been more costly in other terms) in the first place? My intuition is that those who would put a large donation cost behind their time would be those who) for whom it would be difficult already to obtain an introduction. I think that if others make introductions, which is often how traditional networking happens, it seems rather gauche for one to also impose the charitable paywall.
Further, I’d hope that HMO could augment traditionalist networking, perhaps by enabling initial inroads into networks, incurring an initial cost for a way into a chain in which the next steps don’t have financial costs.
I am also less concerned because the Listeners isn’t personally benefiting from the paywall and this makes me less concerned that they would choose to forgo promising conversations. Again, there definitely is the concern, however.
And you’re right, currently no funds. Some seed money would definitely be helpful for development.
You raise an important potential downside. It was already hard for people with shallow pockets to reach people with deep pockets and this might make it harder.
For me personally, I would do the following. Someone cold calls or emails me. If this is an aspiring entrepreneur who has no deep pockets and a good pitch, I will meet with them for free. Same for any NGO or individual making the world a better place. If this is a for-profit company that has X profits I will charge a Y amount that I think is fair for that company to pay me for my time, through a donation to an effective charity. If facebook wants my time I will charge a million.
There’s pros and cons to everything, but the additional money flowing to charities seems more important to me, but we should think of ways for people who can’t afford donations to not be excluded. Replying with your HearMeOut link depending on who cold emails or calls you seems like a simple but effective solution, at least for me, but I’m curious to hear what others think!