I’ve been talking to a lot of people about the weird spot I’m in, career wise.

For the last couple of years, I’ve been giving the larger percentage of my work away. Karmically, it’s done some pretty amazing things. Whuffie points are wayyyy up.

But if 80% of your work is done for karma points, no matter how good the other 20% is, it’s still only 20%.

Many of the people I speak to are surprised that I’m not making money from IndyHall. IndyHall was never designed to pay me, it was designed to sustain itself and the community it helps provide a home to. It’s doing a great job of that, in my opinion, and not many people would argue that point.

I’m actually kinda glad that IndyHall, as it exists today, doesn’t pay me. My interests would be conflicted. The fact that, like everyone else that works here, I’m responsible for finding my own work. Everyone here looks out for one another, that’s just part of the dynamic.

Why. The answer to the question of “why?” isn’t as complicated as it might seem.

If my interests in creating IndyHall weren’t purely fiscal, what were they?

Collaboration really only works if: A. All parties are invested in the outcome AND/OR B. All parties will 'win' with a positive outcome.

— Tara Hunt (@missrogue) October 20, 2008

Because as Tara points out, my long tail self interest is key to this operation. By the entire community succeeding, together or individually, we’re each able to succeed. IndyHall breathes due to organic collaboration.

In each project we that collaboration takes place around, everybody needs to be able to win.