It's interesting that he spends so little on servers.

1 billion chess games per year, often with >20k concurrent users and and some very heavy-duty engine analysis occurring for some proportion of these games and they only spends $56k.

I have seen startups with only hundreds of customers spend 10x this on AWS by copying the fancy tools used by tech giants.

It is also interesting how little the creator pays himself ($56k) and how much he spends on data protection ($40k), taxes ($52k) and various administration tasks. I wonder if his time is as heavily skewed towards administration as his expenditure.

I would also like to meet this guy, buy him a beer/coffee and thank him for the value he has created:).

Computers have been so fast for a good + 15yrs. If you don't use bloatware and pile on layers and layers of crap and with good system engineering it's amazing the amount of work you can compute for so little cost.

> I would also like to meet this guy, buy him a beer/coffee and thank him for the value he has created:).

I had the chance to met him a few years back during a conference in France[1]. He is very friendly indeed.

1: https://mixitconf.org/en/2015/thibault-duplessis-lichess-org...

There's a replay of this talk (from 2015) here: https://www.infoq.com/fr/presentations/lichessorg-open-sourc...

Reminds me memories :)

I had the opposite reaction.

$1000/mo on a few frontend servers for only 20K concurrent users seems excessive.

I've seen simple $40/mo droplets handle 50,000 concurrent websocket connections with minimal latency without breaking a sweat.

$2000/mo on databases is also nuts, unless you're storing hundreds of terabytes at high redundancy levels.

> $2000/mo on databases is also nuts, unless you're storing hundreds of terabytes at high redundancy levels.

What? 300TB at 0,20e /GB which would actually be quite cheap for fast storage at high redundancy would cost 60 000e / month.

I feel like the developer/founder should have a higher salary. $58k a year for running a site with millions of games per day.. deserves more. Is it because they don't get enough donations? Or saving the extra money for growth/buffer?

(edit: originally posted this as a top level comment but felt it fit better here)

Edit2: just checked. I've spent 11 whole days playing chess there (and not sure if that only counts games and not tactics etc). Made my first donation now.

>I feel like the developer/founder should have a higher salary.

This is probably the root of most of tech's angst: people thinking they're entitled to get rich just because they made /run something.

If you can live comfortably doing something as rewarding as making something like Lichess, what more can you really want? People are talking about FU money/financial independence, which I agree is nice, but you can totally get there on $58k/year by living below your means and investing.

The reason I say it leads to angst is when you expect more than a comfortable salary, you're imposing a higher financial burden on the overall system than necessary, which can sometimes work in the short term, but in the long term introduces drag on development/stability because those extra thousands you're personally socking away aren't going towards, say, getting a contractor to address little issues or going into the rainy day fund.

I'm not talking about entitlement. But this guy is really good at multiple things. SRE, frontend, backend, project management etc. He could probably earn twice as much working a normal job, and even more for the right company.

He don't want to. And maybe don't want/need to earn more. And that is completely fine. But his impact is huuuge. I'd wish more people did like him. But I don't think many will, because those skilled enough to make something similar would rather work for a higher salary.

So it's more a sigh from me, that I'd wish more people would be able to sustain making and giving away something great like this, without having to sacrifice money. Why should optimizing ad clicks give you millions, but making this only thousands?

You know, in the same way there often are discussions here about making open source income viable. It would be better for everyone if these unsung heroes got more than just praise. Then others would follow suit.

> But this guy is really good at multiple things. SRE, frontend, backend, project management etc. He could probably earn twice as much working a normal job, and even more for the right company.

AFAIK, he is French, so you need to compare it with the local job market: there's no way he could get twice as much even in the most-paying company here, the market price for such a profile is probably around €70k, assuming he wanted to work in Paris[1] (or maybe Lille or Lyon), and if he lives anywhere else in France, he's probably already earning as much as he could wish, and he's working one something that matters to him. I would totally take such a deal.

[1] Ok, this is probably way less relevant nowadays, since covid made remote work mainstream for most of us, but remote work was barely imaginable in most French company before the pandemic came.

He seems like he is truly in the upper echelons of engineering and product development ability, including soft skills as well. I’m sure he could easily make more than €70k. He might need to live in a major city though.

Pretty sure he lives somewhere in Western France where housing is a lot more affordable than Paris (or Lille or Lyon).

If he keeps 100% of ownership, that 58k can become 500k in a few years?

What do you mean by ownership? Lichess is a non-profit association, not a limited company owned by the developer.

If you shelve the cynicism, I think the main reason you want a big pile of cash around is so when you discover that thing that makes you happy you don’t miss out on it. You don’t have to compromise.

But people get distracted by things they “can afford,” the amount of money they “need” ratchets way up, and they find themselves missing out on things and making compromises anyway.

If you have already found a thing or two that makes you happy, you don’t need to hedge so much. You don’t have to keep trying to stuff things into a hole in your chest trying to fill it up.

Many, many of my parents’ problems went away when one of them started making over $50k a year. If they had been more content then it would have solved many more. Adjusted for inflation that’s a bit more than $58K today, but if your spouse is doing well enough, that’s still perfectly workable. If your health holds.

Gross avg. wage in France is $42700[1] if calculated with 12 months and no variable benefits. Mean would be more interesting, but I don't seem to easily find it.

It might sound weirdly low for someone in IT in the USA, but first, not everyone commands FAANG sales, and second, wages in the EU are comparatively low. With some seniority, you can rise to $100k relatively easily, but you have to sell your soul to either some consulting company or old Fortune-500 industries.

So could be the dev takes an above-avg wage which would be around junior to semi experienced level developer and just does what they want to do: build a chess community.

EDIT: I don't fully understand the tax part, but if the nonprofit also pays his taxes and he goes out with $54k net, he's doing very, very well for an EU country. I've just reached that level give or take and I have lots of seniority in a really profitable old economy country. If I would be gunning higher, I'd have to do consulting or go the people management track.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_countries_by_...

Someone of his caliber could easily work remotely and earn 200k+ a year

> It might sound weirdly low for someone in IT in the USA, but first, not everyone commands FAANG sales, and second, wages in the EU are comparatively low. With some seniority, you can rise to $100k relatively easily, but you have to sell your soul to either some consulting company or old Fortune-500 industries.

Exactly.

The non profit is registered in a small town of Maine-et-Loire.[1] Assuming this is close to where the developer lives, €42k goes a long way there. You also have to factor in that he doesn't have to take the Parisian Metro every morning and live in a tiny apartment for €1,000/month.

[1] See the "Is Lichess a non profit?" https://lichess.org/patron

> €42k

Note that a competent full-stack Scala developer like Thibault can easily make €70-80k at a French company while working mostly/fully remote. And even more so going into contracting and/or working for foreign clients.

He has his own reasons, working on his own thing being a huge one obviously, but he could definitely make more and keep a similar lifestyle.

The $56k/€42k is before tax [π].

Personally I would struggle to pay for a house, support dependants, and save for retirement on that amount. Partially because I went back to $zero in my thirties (although I know plenty of people in the same category much older... Trying to catch up is hard mode).

[π] https://old.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/mpasyl/i_started_lic...

FAANG salaries in the EU / UK can be nearly as high as in the US though, which in some locations does drive up the compensation for all SWEs.

Based on StackOverflow dev survey, EU salaries are roughly 60% of what you get in the US. You'll be hard-pressed to find equivalent positions paying the same in both regions.

Are those 1:1 comparisons? I know typically in the US salaries advertised are not exactly take-home pay, but before tax amounts, and is some places in Europe salaries are advertised as take-home pay.

Well it'll never be 1:1 due to differences in health care etc., of course, but those were all before tax from what I understood.

Not sure how companies advertising take-home pay would work when your tax rate depends on e.g. marital status (at least in Germany it could be off by maybe a factor of 2 in both directions), which country/region are you thinking of there?

The salaries in London for FAANG are equivalent to about 60-70% of those in the US. The stock grants are typically smaller, also, though this is less true for software engineers.

The one I used to work for had a real problem of developers leaving for the US on an internal transfer after 12 months, precisely because of the salaries.

I recall an AMA on Reddit, where the founder said he is perfectly fune with his salary as long as LiChess stays free and he can continue doing what he loves.

Here's the AMA: https://old.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/mpasyl/i_started_lic...

And the answer in question: https://old.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/mpasyl/i_started_lic...

"That's my salary before income taxes. I think it's about right.

Could I make more by selling my skills to the highest bidder? Probably.

Would I be happier? Hell no.

The way I see it, that's a lot money for a job I can do at my own rhythm from the comfort of my home. And instead of bosses or clients, I work for an awesome community."

Thanks!

I think the founder should have "fuck you" money, not just a reasonable salary.

You are projecting your own desires onto the founder (which is fine, but worth thinking about why they don't want the same thing as you). It seems clear that they are happy with their salary/work. For some people, more money beyond this is not a good thing.

I'm not. It's not about having more money to spend, but having enough to be permanently secure.

The founder could have FU money, still draw a ~50k/yr salary and keep their spending at the same level. The only difference is that if circumstances change the founder is still secure instead.

If I could wave a wand and give you enough money to quit tomorrow, what would you do with yourself?

What if your best friend were already doing his thing? Would you feel the urge to send me to talk to him, or is he good?

I don't know what you second line means, but I would continue working. Possibly reduced hours, but still working.

If you’re already doing the thing you would do if you could do anything, do you still feel the need for “enough money” to walk out and go do it. I think, and some other posters seem to agree, that the answer is a qualified no.

If you gave me enough money I would quit. Can you include some seed money for my new startup?

I would argue he already does. The entire point of "fuck you" money is that you are no longer beholden to someone else - it is not so much defined by the overall amount, but by the freedom it can buy you. He gets to work on what he loves doing every day doing it exactly the way he wants.

My definition of FU money is that you have enough money to be secure no matter what.

I think he would still rely on the month to month or year to year income rather than being completely secure.

The joy of FU money https://thedeepdish.org/fuck-you-money/

Nobody is completely secure.

I’m currently trying to figure out if I wanted to work 20 hours a month post-retirement, what sort of work that would look like.

There are a handful of nature and nurture reasons that tell me that full retirement would likely be very bad for my health. And of course partial retirement I could start a little sooner.

Well it seems like the founder doesn't want more money. Not everyone needs or wants "fuck you" money, and with that kind of salary you can afford a decent life in (most of) France.

This is assuming that this stream of income doesn't ever dry up.

I personally think that the founder should have enough money to never worry about money, or at least have a big buffer.

If at some point in the future for whatever reason Lichess gets less donations, he could be screwed.

On the other hand if he had a bit of a warchest he either has runway to increase revenue or to find another source of income.

>If at some point in the future for whatever reason Lichess gets less donations, he could be screwed.

No doubt they would get a job like the rest of us.

The problem with your proposition is it can never be satisfied, you will never have enough.

> No doubt they would get a job like the rest of us

"I personally think that the founder should have enough money to never worry about money, or at least have a big buffer"

> The problem with your proposition is it can never be satisfied, you will never have enough

Where did you get this idea from? If you control your expenses (Like it sounds like the founder does) then the "never having enough" problem doesn't exist. At that point more money just means a larger buffer.

Then really Lichess should have FU money. This both secures his income as long as he continues working on it, then lets him hire a replacement whenever he decides to retire.

Sure, it's up the founder of course. I think the they've created enough value to deserve that money for themselves and to use in any way they see fit though.

Maybe that would be putting it back into Lichess when they retire or maybe after 10 years they decide they want to work on something else and they live off that money to do so.

The man describes himself as a pastafarian antifascist and lichess as a hippie communist chess server. I don't think he has the same opinion on money as you do.

In France that's a reasonable salary for an experienced engineer.

I agree it's low for someone running the whole show, but then he is doing it as a non-profit.

Tech salaries in the US are really high compared to RoW, even once CoL is taken into account.

Holy hell that's an expensive project. Do donations cover all this, or are the operators independently wealthy and generous?

That's a cheap project. I have seen a single developer's salary to be more than that. Considering that around a billion games were played last year in lichess.

What I find interesting is the part at the bottom that shows how much a donation helps: a $5 donation is enough to cover the company's budget for 6 minutes. This sounds really good for a few reasons: 1) since I play Lichess for several hours a month, I feel that I'm really getting my money's worth; 2) Lichess only needs a few thousand people to contribute $5/mo to stay net positive and I feel like it's easier to convince a few thousand people in a supportive community to part ways with $5 than it is for other companies to get a million people to donate $1; 3) I remember Reddit used to show on your profile how many server minutes your Gold purchase was worth and it would display something like 200 minutes for every $5 purchase, but this is only a single server out of hundreds and doesn't account for any other expenses, so Lichess is unsurprisingly very cheap to operate in comparison.

Uh, $55k a year is not cheap! What world... Ok, it's late, I'll hold back the rest of my words. :)

I think you were saying it's cheap relative to the impact it has. I agree. But "holy hell that's expensive" is an entirely accurate reaction for someone who wants to fund it out of pocket.

(Gwern covers our TPU/ML infrastructure costs for around $350/mo, and I wince that I wasn't able to optimize it cheaper.)

55k is just the cost of the server. The total cost is 400k

Holy guacamole, I didn't scroll down far enough. Thank you for pointing this out.

"French taxes" is $53k, which is nearly equal to their server fees. Wow.

Props to them for however they manage to get $400k/yr for a free project with no business model, and no intended business model. (I'm serious; it's a wonderful thing for the world, and a tremendous example of what people can achieve without having a monetary focus.)

I don't have enough details about the exact setup, but the server cost looks excessive* to me. Especially those Xeon Gold and Silver machines (are they using managed hosting or what). Almost all of them are in single OVH data center too, that's not very robust.

* Compared to a certain German hosting provider, where I can get AMD EPYC 7502P with 128GB RAM for about 100EUR. Again don't know the arrangement, but with some effort they could add more servers, lower the cost and add Geo-resiliency.

"to a certain German hosting provider" Hetzner

Yeah, don't want to provide free advertising (they don't need it), but they should be as reliable as OVH for hosting servers in Europe.

Until you get DDOSed and then they (Hetzner) null-route your server.

They claim not to:

https://twitter.com/hetzner_online/status/968085046073622528...

I do wonder if that is still the case.

edit: Maybe not: https://community.centminmod.com/threads/any-personal-feedba...

That is quite normal behavior for most hosters and it depends on the strength of DDOS. If you have to deal with DDOS frequently then you need a loadbalancer in between your service and your clients, that offers DDOS protection.

Those secret costs seem extreme for something that's only serving a few millions websockets a day

Interesting that a non profit pays 55k in French taxes

Most likely taxes on wage for the main developer salary. The tax wedge in France is slightly under 50%, so that checks out.

It's progressive and only gets to 45% once you reach €155K so that doesn't sound quite right.

I believe he's talking about social contributions (health, retirement, unemployment), that the employer pays, and not the taxes on revenue (paid by the employee).