In-depth founder interviews, MRR journeys and post-mortems, with the real numbers.
180 posts
A composite founder diary. A payments customer sent an eleven page DORA addendum with a one percent of turnover penalty clause. Four days of reading the regulation showed that no EU regulator could fine us at all, that the size relief is reserved for regulated firms, and that the real cost was free incident support written into the contract.
ZSF's 2025 return shows $921,832 of revenue, one employee on $159,790 and $583,111 going out to contractors. Reconciled against the foundation's own published books, which agree to the cent on everything except depreciation.
A composite founder diary. At 74K MRR a letter arrived calling us a video tape service provider, on the strength of a two minute demo clip and an advertising pixel. What I found in 18 U.S.C. 2710: no size exemption, no state of mind tier, a 2,500 dollar floor set in 1988, and a definition of who may sue that three federal appeal courts read two different ways.
The Apache Software Foundation took $2,220,257 in the year to 30 April 2025 and spent $2,334,727, its first loss in the recent series. Its own board had budgeted $3,000,000 of income and a $239,250 surplus. Read from three filed Form 990 returns and ASF's published budgets.
A composite founder diary. At 73K MRR we had disclosed every background check and asked permission every time. The violation was a second, unrelated paragraph sitting on the disclosure form, and the size of the bill turned on one word in the liability section.
Rust Foundation revenue was $5,274,907 in 2025 against $4,810,306 of expenses. All five Form 990 filings, from the filed XML, including the year page one does not have. Membership dues actually fell, and Part VII reported the Executive Director at $0 for three straight years.
A composite founder diary. At 72K MRR a stranger opened a UDRP proceeding against the domain our entire product resolves to. It is not a lawsuit, it is a private arbitration incorporated by reference into a registrar checkout I clicked in 2019. The complaint cost them USD 1,500 and every option available to me cost more than that.
FSF reported revenue of $1,362,457 for the year ended September 30, 2025 against $1,431,359 of expenses. Its audited statements report $1,511,523 and a surplus. Five Form 990 filings cover three years, two of them amended.
A composite founder diary. At 71K MRR a thank-you email from a teacher told me thirty-one children used our general-audience product. That sentence was not a warning. Actual knowledge is what puts a general-audience operator inside the children's privacy rule, and a knowing violation is what prices it at $53,088 a day.
The PSF reported revenue of $4,086,997 for 2024 against expenses of $5,765,854. Its own annual report shows $4,293,000 and puts the money in opposite buckets. Unrestricted reserves are down 46.7% in two years, the public support percentage moved 26 points on one vanished line, and Sub-Saharan Africa has overtaken Europe as its largest grant region.
A composite founder diary. At 70K MRR a nine-page demand letter said an analytics script made me a wiretapper. California's civil remedy is 5,000 dollars per violation, double the criminal fine the State itself could impose, and the bill that would remove one of the three counts was sitting unsigned on the Governor's desk.
Signal Foundation revenue was $29,413,537 in 2024 against $38,019,696 of expenses, and year-end net assets fell to minus $4,724,975. The Foundation also earned $6,386,666 of licensing fees, owes Brian Acton $33,810,810 against a $105,000,400 note none of which has been repaid, and paid $227,425 of federal income tax in 2023.
