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Comment by dragonwriter | Hacker News Reader

> Is change.org a for-profit enterprise?

By their own description, no, though they are identical to one in at least superficial legal form (I don't know if their corporate governing documents do anything to address this.) Note that not-for-profit is not a crisp legal category ("nonprofit" is a term used for specific tax classification which requires a number of other qualifications and accepting a number of behavioral restrictions, including on political activity, on top of being not operated for profit.)

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The linked article describes them as a for-profit org.

> Change.org, a for-profit petition and fundraising website focused on social and political change.

They are a B-corp for what that's worth.

> The linked article describes them as a for-profit org.

The linked article provides no basis for this description and, without any cited basis and given change.org's consistent description of not being operated for profit, seems to be making the (fairly common) mistake of confusing the absence of the tax status of "nonprofit" (which requires a lot more than being not-for-profit) with being "for profit". There are quite a number of not-for-profit entities that are not nonprofits.

Nonprofits have cash flow and profit/loss too, they just call the profit 'surplus'.

Not-for-profit (including that as part of the qualification of a tax exempt nonprofit) has nothing to do with the entity not making surplus revenues, it has more to do with the entity not being a tool to return profits to those who control it.

Exactly. That's why I don't understand the usage of the term "investment".

"Investment" is often used in senses where the return being sought is a social good and not a financial return to the investors. This could be viewed as either a metaphor for financial investment or a literal investment in utilitarian terms for which financial terms are, after all, only a convenient proxy.

I really wish they would make it easier for example to convert a "for-profit" to a self-perpetuating board of directors for example.

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