alt Hacker Newsyou're right, 'con' was far too strong and unfair of a word.
They seem like decent enough people, but completely incapable of running a project like this. Which is what a significant portion of the non-profit world is made up of.
I don't think its all good though if someone donates to keep it alive - there's many FAR more worthy organizations to give money to, be it for plastic or any other cause. And, quite often, those that receive large amounts of funds are far better at marketing (or, worse, playing "the game"), than actually operating
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Propelloni • last Wednesday at 7:43 AM
Who would you donate to, if you'd donate to an effort in the "plastic space"?
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I agree with almost everything, except that it's a problem if someone donates.
Some of the donation game is a competition (for example, applying for grants, or foundation funding), where the dynamic you described dominates. Much of it is not. In many cases, a rich person just cuts a check out of their leisure budget. That's why I compared this to buying a supercar. The rich person learns something, and has something fun to do more constructive than, well, many of the things rich people do.
Money is a social construct; it's just a way of keeping score, and organizing people. At the end, what matters is what you do, and what resources you use. The better question isn't what else the /money/ could be used for, but what else the actual inputs --- the /people, space, and tools/ --- could be used for.
If those same people are making military weapons, optimizing ad clicks, or running cons, that's a negative use of resources.
It's very possible a rich person decides they just want to:
- give a bunch of people space to follow their passion (same as an arts grant);
- view this as a part of personal development (same as giving tuition to a college);
- a research grant (interesting open information will come out, which is perhaps a few steps away from being useful;
- promotion of recycling; or
- just funding this on the off-chance something big comes of it.
It's all good.