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Comment by xs | Hacker News Reader

I think $40/yr or $2/icon is too far out of reach for me to use these icons as a proof of concept, blog, or early website launches. I have a website idea which would use about 100 of these icons, but I can't justify the cost yet since it brings in no revenue.

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$40/yr isn't that expensive for "artwork". Domain names and hosting can be more expensive.

Hiring a graphical artist for an hour will probably be a lot more expensive

hiring a graphic designer usually means you get exclusive rights to their output, which is a tremendous difference.

But who needs exclusivity for proof of concepts?

The icons are Creative Commons licensed so there's always the cheap-ass option of not paying them.

At 3$/mo (averaged) it's been a great deal for me. I do lots of website/other designs and they're royalty free so I can do anything I want with them (except use them as a logo). It makes it easy for me because say, I want a svg of a penguin, BAM got one right there (169 actually).

Likewise. Seems like a really great price if you're a designer, but too steep if you only use it occasionally. I use Noun Project semi-regularly with the CC licensing, but only for not-for-profit purposes, so $40 is too much.

I'd probably pay a one-off fee ($20? $30?) just to use the app though, even if it meant requiring attribution for all icons used.

$40 is a bargain when you consider how many hours it takes for a person create an entire icon set. It's not as if illustrators are rolling in money here.

Yeah, completely agreed -- that's the thing about the pricing, it almost seems too cheap for designers who could use it every day and create huge amounts of value, but also too expensive for casual users like myself, who aren't making a cent on anything using it.

With the app in particular, even though I'd only end up using one or two icons, I'd really like to just be able to use the app to prototype/browse icons. Which is why I'd be very happy to pay a one-off fee to use the app, even if I then have to separately purchase/attribute the individual icons I use. At the moment, you have to be a subscriber to use the app.

If you are on a developer salary this makes no sense

You can use them for free if you put the Creative Commons credit on an acknowledgements page with a link to where you got it.

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