this post was submitted on 28 Feb 2024
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I think what they stated was that they spent $400 on R&D in 2023 - you know, the year where, after 20 years of twiddling their thumbs and doing shit-all, depending on volunteers to run the site, and RES and 3rd party apps to make it usable, and imgur to provide hosting, etc etc - the year when they finally had to actually do some real coding.
I'm wondering how much of 2023's R&D was spurred by restricting the API code, and then allowing certain applications access; having to finally take seriously their decade-old promise to develop mod tools with no planning or preparation; their total surprise at having to provide access to disabled people; and having to update their app. Those are all areas where they were extremely happy to let languish, and which they suddenly had to provide expedited support for after the protests.
400 million? For slightly dusting off an app and somewhat improving some aspects of their site?
Think about, what that means. If we assume a very generous 400k per engineer, that would result in 1000 people working full-time for a year. Just in RnD. And for what exactly?
Actually, 400 million is exactly as much as it takes to pay 10 engineers 100k to write code, and 399 managers 1 million each to do scrum meetings