Jokes aside... Can you elaborate on just what "this" and "it" is? Cause "this and "it" sound like giving your company money without provisions so that you can continue to remain in its employ.

Superfluous disclosure: I have no idea if I speak for anyone else here.

You keep your own money.

Think "walk miles for cancer research" drive. The catch is that what creates the profit needs to be made / done this month. It's against the spirit of the contest to log income from elsewhere.

Also, this has nothing to do with my employment, nor are you giving me or my company anything. It's merely a "profit pledge drive." Self reported.

BUT: something like this, in such a short time, is best done collaboratively. That's the objective. It's a goal, and nothing more or less.

Edit: see update.

<ultra bold>What, PRECISELY, is it that you want the members of this community to do?</ultra bold>

- Write code for you? - Write a check to you? - Let you invest in our startups and liquidate by the end of the month?

The X-Men should bring you on as a cofounder for your keen ability to stump people with your being vague. This may cause problems for Professor, though, because he'd then have nothing to read.

He is apparently offering 3k to people that are willing to work at this under his direction. I would probably take him up on the offer but I'm on the other side of the USA and only have fake hacking skills.

This is of course very bubble-tastic but there is a lot of money in popular Facebook apps. I saw an app for "Fans of Grey's Anatomy" that had 100,000 active users yesterday, there is definitely money in reproducing fan sites for popular TV shows and bands and movies as Facebook applications.

Does 'active users' actually equate to profit? I hear clickthrough rates for advertising on facebook is something like 0.05% If 100,000 users were active, that would equate to 50 clicks on adverts, which is probably going to make enough money to buy a coffee or something.

Apparently the advertising clickthrough rates are better in the apps, possibly because a lot of facebook app advertisements are paid ads for other apps.

Also, "VC firm" means something else that we're not doing. This is an angel fund run by bored geeks in silicon valley. That's it.

i.e. I have a business that generates $5k per month, saying you can use that towards your goal "in spirit" is pretty silly, right?

BTW have you heard of Steve Pavlina's Million Dollar Experiment? http://www.stevepavlina.com/million-dollar-experiment.htm

This sounds a bit like it only for startups.

Million Dollar Experiment: I haven't heard of this, but you're exactly right. I'm glad I core dumped this idea here first. Wow, risk is hard in practice as a tech guy.

It would be nice to have some kind of buddy system to help encourage one another and share strategies / techniques.

Current profit: ~ $3k between my various businesses.

Why is it that googling for "ByIQ" doesn't turn up any useful hits?

The DNS will be resolved by sometime Monday.

I've been building something in my spare time for the last few weeks, and it could be making money in the next month. (It sounds like that's what you're looking for.) So... what would happen now, exactly? It sounds like all you want me to do is email you some proof of profit at the end of the month or something, is that right? You talked about spotting expenses, how would we arrange that?

Thanks for the tip.

There should probably be a comma between "Help" and "YC News".

If it can be done for hacking projects, it can be done for business.

That sentence says volumes, both about you and the organization you're representing.

He knows where he is starting and where is going but not the journey inbetween. I think thats pretty fair. Give him time.

1. It is quite similar to Steve Pavlina's Million Dollar Experiment.

2. My interpretation is that this is a sort of a "club" where anyone is welcome to contribute ideas and work on their own or in ad hoc collaborations to increase the value to the world and as a by product report their earnings so that Andrew Yates can add them to his total as being the trigger for this whole thing. This is like the butterfly effect in chaos theory or a leadership training in the real world. This month will be fun for the participants and is achievable.

I won't be able to come to the face to face meeting (I'm in Israel) but will participate if there is a website. waiting for byiq.com

Instead of 100K you're aiming at 1MM?

I'm working on a subscription based web site, I like the challange and this will help me to motivate myself to work extra on making it fast!

Thanks! I like the idea.

I'll see how much capital I can get on short notice. Seed amounts (a few thousand for equipment like PCs and office stuff, base living expenses) I can spot. Office space too, though we're in the process of moving from a small office to a larger one, so I can't spot you a private office this month.

Real capital, what you would need to hire and whatnot... that's a process that takes longer than a month, so it's not immediately applicable. There's no reason not to raise capital, though.