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Comment by lawtalkinghuman | Hacker News Reader

> Does everything require a money motive?

On HN, apparently. See the recent thread on Wordle.

The reality is likely to be: they make a very small amount from ads and user donations that might, if they're lucky, cover the costs of hosting. The warez scene is a subculture and community for the people who participate in it.

It is depressing that HN participants are so often mystified by the idea people might be motivated by intrinsic or social factors to engage in peer-based production (whether legal or not) when so many of the companies they run or work for exist only because of peer-based production efforts like Linux and other FOSS software.

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> The reality is likely to be: they make a very small amount from ads and user donations that might, if they're lucky, cover the costs of hosting

Opensubtitles has a VIP program at $15 a year.

It's quite easy to find the person who runs the site and, according to their CV, this is basically their job. That'd make Opensubtitles a for-profit piracy site, i guess.

> according to their CV, this is basically their job. That'd make Opensubtitles a for-profit piracy site, i guess.

Guess what: Non-profit != for-free && Non-profit != for-a-loss.

If in order for opensubtitles to fulfill its envisioned role needs full-time attention, it is legit to pay yourself or hire an employee, paid by the ad and or subscription money. That's what also happens on all registered non-profit organizations.

Yeah, I saw it had a subscription model for VIP users. I'm guessing they're not getting Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates level rich off it though.

Subtitles aren't piracy in any way though. Kind of similar to legality of torrent sites but even less questionable.

I don't think they're implying the subtitles themselves are piracy, but the users of opensubtitles.org are overwhelmingly using them for pirated media. The subs are all indexed against scene versions of the video files (as you can tell from their names), and that's what most users are using it for. After all, streaming services, DVDs, and other legitimate ways of consuming these shows/movies already come with subtitles.

No, the 0.1% of subs for obscure indie shows that didn't have native subs doesn't change that.

It takes hours of work to translate one hour of movie, so when a translated subtitle is copied, it is most certainly piracy. If you are faster than that please consider becoming a translator for sites like the TED foundation.

I think you massively underestimate how much ads can bring in with a high traffic website: https://www.similarweb.com/website/opensubtitles.org/

I'd guess about $1-3M/year from ads.

You are overestimating how much ad revenue comes in from non Tier 1 countries and from that specific niche. I'd be surprised if they get more than $1-2 per 1000 visitors. Could be lower than that

$1 / 1000 visitor is $110k / month with 11 million visitors which agrees with my estimation.

You want to double check your math there?

Hahh, "I don't need a calculator" :) Regardless, I can't find the source, but I remember reading that this site is a cash cow.

I should have been more clearer. Please see my other comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29991505 for clarification. I am glad to see comments like yours at HN honestly.

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