And you get a world-class service that a lot of people can use for free and keeps their communication private in return. I'll happily keep donating for that.

I'm sure there are some costs that they could theoretically cut without consequence. Because the same holds for any other product I buy.

> I do not see any excess here. You need to pay to compete.

What you mean with pay to compete? The goal of Signal to exist is to offer a privacy oriented chat app. Non-profit companies serve a propose, and people not aligned with that, shouldn't be working there in the first place. If you join a non-profit to make money, you are doing it wrong.

So all the programmers who work there should live on thin air? I agree that ideally the management should not be there for profit, but come on, the salaries are not even that crazy. I suspect FAANG key employees in that area easily earn multiples of that.

> Signal is competing with for profit companies for talented engineers and their

> talented leaders.

In Bay Area? I'm quite sure you get great people all around the World, or in USA, by much less.

That line of thought is exactly why FAAMG companies tried to lower salaries for CoL when they opened up to more remote roles. I don't know if thst was fair, but it wasn't something appreciated by many engineers during the pandemic.

It's also how and why long ago they tried to outsource a lot of engineering. They still do try. But that's not an easy transition either.

> So all the programmers who work there should live on thin air?

We are talking about C*, Engineer Manager, getting almost 700k/year. Not developers.

Yes, so what's the problem?

> Yes, so what's the problem?

What is the problem of managers of a non-profit company earning around 700k/year and the company is writing blog posts complaining that the the company operation is too expensive? I think if you read it aloud, you will understand it.

When the numbers total $50m in operations and the CEO is making about as much as a principal Google engineer: no, I don't see the issue. Even if he made $0 the issue remains given that every part of the server operation costs more than him.

But sure. What do you think is a fair salary or totalccomp for a founder and CEO of a popular, privacy focused app?

> CEO is making about as much as a principal Google engineer

From a company living from donations... It is illusion (probably a California thing), to think that you are going to compete salary wise with FAANG. The time will tell (well their complaining about money, is already hinting it)...

But they aren't. A principal engineer is not a CEO but probably makes more at top companies.

I don't even work at a FAANG and I was making almost as much as the director there who lists 200k or so total comp. Probably with 20 years less experience to boot. I don't live in SF either; High CoL area but not SF.

That's why I asked you what's a "reasonable" salary. I'm wondering what your POV here is in terms of compensation.

Top European salary would be a third of that.

Signal is competing with for profit companies for talented engineers and their talented leaders. You can't just cobble together something "good enough", this thing must be airtight given some of the dangerous situations it is used in.

Indeed, I’m blown away these numbers are so low. I know multiple senior software engineers at FAANG companies who make more than the software engineers on that list, and they contribute roughly nothing to society. I have zero qualms with Signal executives and employees being paid at that level.