A very, very generous donation I received yesterday for my JavaScript Image Cropper UI reminded me of a conversation I had with my friend Martin Laine quite a while ago during an instant messenger conversation when we both happened to get donations for our separate coding projects (him for his fantastic Audio Player WordPress plugin and me for my JavaScript Image Cropper UI - again) at the same time.
That conversation, I feel, gives quite a concise view of what donations mean to people like me and Martin (and possibly everyone else who asks for donations to support their free projects) so I thought I would share it here to give you the view from the other side of the PayPal account.
The conversation went something like this:
Martin:
Dude, I just got a donation
Me:
Yeah, me too.
*Snip gratuitous discussion of massive amounts of money we received in donations*
Martin:
It’s great isn’t it
Me:
Yeah, it’s nice that people like what you do enough to take the time out and give you a little something as a thankyou. It’s not even really about the money, it’s just that warm and fuzzy feeling it gives you.
Martin:
Exactly!
Ok so I probably paraphrased that conversation a little and may have made Martin sound a little dull, and I fear I am guilty of adding the emphasis on that last statement (sometimes exclamation marks are necessary, whereas multiple exclamation marks are never necessary - unless you’re in marketing it seems,) also I’m pretty sure he didn’t actually start this digression with the word “Dude”. But the point is it’s great to have people recognise your work in that way, and since I started receiving my few donations I have found myself donating more than I used to to people and programs that help me out in their own little (or large) way.
Share the warm fuzzy feelingTM I say.
Tip photo courtesy of MReece on Flickr, used under Creative Commons licence.