# I want to build a software product and flow revenue to contributors **URL:** \ **Category:** Uncategorized\ **Created:** [May 1, 2020, 3:48pm UTC](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/t/i-want-to-build-a-software-product-and-flow-revenue-to-contributors/712 "2020-05-01T15:48:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1

**Author:** ![ianL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bc8723/32.png) [@ianL](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/u/ianL)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 3:48pm UTC](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/t/i-want-to-build-a-software-product-and-flow-revenue-to-contributors/712/1 "2020-05-01T15:48:49Z")

SourceCred, I’m a respectful skeptic (because I’ve spent so much thought-energy trying to solve the same problem that SourceCred is working on, and feel like forces of nature and the god particle are guarding the solution from me) I’d like to offer a low-tech alternative solution as an invitation to prove to me that SourceCred is the answer. - I have a repo in GitHub that represents my software product - each time I merge a contribution to the main branch, I decide on a dollar value for that piece of work and add it to a ledger (most basic idea of ‘ledger’ here–no crypto, although, I suppose the ledger document itself could be saved to a blockchain to make it trustable) - any time my software product is purchased, the money gets distributed according to the total percentages of value per-contributor documented in the ledger - over time, as the project owner, I will either gain approval or disapproval by the community of contributors as they see how the income is distributed - contributor Z could create a fork, and accept pull requests for their fork, and create their own ledger in the same way, so that when contributor Z gets their fork merged with my main branch, income flows to contributor Z based on my ledger, which is further distributed/flowed to their contributors, etc. etc. - any and every entity in this system decides when and how to flow their income to their contributors and dependencies, and the reputation system blossoms from each entity-outward As I read back what I just wrote, (the part about saving the low-tech ledger to a block chain) I’m realizing that this basic idea IS a cryptocurrency. i.e: - I spin up my personal token - for every contribution, I decide how much coin to mint and award the contributor - my coin’s trust value is represented by the historical flow of income to coin holders Now to extrapolate to the logical future: - my parents spin up my personal coin when I’m born - and teach me how to responsibly mint and flow value to the contributors in my life - so that I can grow up and engage with the economy of personal block chain networks thanks to @s_ben for introducing me to SourceCred and meandering in discussion with me ---

**Author:** ![s\_ben](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex032/user_avatar/discourse.sourcecred.io/s_ben/32/816_2.png) [@s\_ben](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/u/s_ben)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 9:42pm UTC](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/t/i-want-to-build-a-software-product-and-flow-revenue-to-contributors/712/2 "2020-05-01T21:42:32Z")

Hey @ianL! Gald to finally snare you in the graph 🙂 @ianL is a regular at the crypto coworking meetup I host, and has been a good sport letting me rant about SourceCred and providing good skeptical feedback. My ❤ on your post just minted you your first cred 😈 😈 > **[Portland Crypto Coworking | Meetup](https://www.meetup.com/Portland-Crypto-Coworking/)** > > A meetup for anyone working remotely in cryptocurrency. I started this just to get out of the house and meet some interesting crypto peeps. Engage as little or as much as you like as we cowork in the beautiful TaborSpace common area. Citizens of all... > [@ianL](#): > > I have a repo in GitHub that represents my software product Can you invite me to said (presumably private) repo? > [@ianL](#): > > contributor Z could create a fork, and accept pull requests for their fork, and create their own ledger in the same way, so that when contributor Z gets their fork merged with my main branch, income flows to contributor Z based on my ledger, which is further distributed/flowed to their contributors, etc. etc. This seems similar to our new Initiative plugin (docs [coming soon)](https://github.com/sourcecred/docs/blob/master/docs/guides/platforms/initiatives.md). Basically someone that has worked on something for the project (e.g. a partnership) will propose an Initiative, which has a JSON file specifying the underlying contributions, weights on those contributions, and a proposed “payout” (amount of cred to be minted). You can see our first batch of merged Initiatives [here](https://github.com/sourcecred/cred/pull/27) if you’re curious. > [@ianL](#): > > As I read back what I just wrote, (the part about saving the low-tech ledger to a block chain) I’m realizing that this basic idea IS a cryptocurrency. i.e: > > - I spin up my personal token > - for every contribution, I decide how much coin to mint and award the contributor > - my coin’s trust value is represented by the historical flow of income to coin holders This is pretty much how [Grain](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/t/grain/499) will operate. > [@ianL](#): > > Now to extrapolate to the logical future: > > - my parents spin up my personal coin when I’m born > - and teach me how to responsibly mint and flow value to the contributors in my life > - so that I can grow up and engage with the economy of personal block chain networks A twist on this was actually a subplot of a Black Mirror [episode](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bFCqK81s7Y). But instead of minting coin, people were suing their parents for dammages to their future earning caused by the parents being shitty. > [@ianL](#): > > thanks to @s_ben for introducing me to SourceCred and meandering in discussion with me Welcome to the machine! ---

**Author:** ![ianL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bc8723/32.png) [@ianL](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/u/ianL)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2020, 4:11pm UTC](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/t/i-want-to-build-a-software-product-and-flow-revenue-to-contributors/712/3 "2020-05-04T16:11:15Z")

Ah, sorry, my theoretical scenario was misleading–I don’t actually have a GitHub repo going yet. 🤥 ---

**Author:** ![s\_ben](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex032/user_avatar/discourse.sourcecred.io/s_ben/32/816_2.png) [@s\_ben](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/u/s_ben)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2020, 6:52pm UTC](https://discourse.sourcecred.io/t/i-want-to-build-a-software-product-and-flow-revenue-to-contributors/712/4 "2020-05-04T18:52:29Z")

Tease