That question seriously resonated with me when I saw it raised in the GitHub thread. (https://github.com/standard/standard/issues/1381#issuecommen...)

Any package which transitively includes `standard/standard` also inherits the advertisement. That would seem to suggest a kind of logic like "if people are going to use my work to help make their thing successful, it's only fair that I'm rewarded too." And that really does make sense. I could totally nerd out over the idea of a graph-based incentive structure, maybe implemented with a new crypto token for extra gee-whiz spiciness. If his prototype `feross/funding` package had been launched with a built-in technical mechanism for transitive profit-sharing I think the idea might just have been intriguing enough to distract from some of the appalling terribleness of embedding ads in package post-install messages.