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Comment by Maakuth | Hacker News Reader

I don't quite get what is he trying to communicate here. The graph shows that there was some profit during the last summer but since then the income has failed to pay for the expenses. The text reads partially like a post-mortem of a failed project, partially like that of a success. Is he happy or not?

For the record, I'm a happy NewsBlur subscriber and will definitely renew my subscription.

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The author of the graph should perhaps read up on Rev Rec[1], particularly the idea of deferred revenue.

It seems that they are counting subscription revenue at the time it is paid, rather than recognizing over the length of the subscription picture. The later would give you a much better idea on how the business is operating.

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenue_recognition

They'll hit another spike when users from the google reader shutdown renew their yearly subscriptions.

That seems likely. It would make the message clearer if this was explicit in the text.

I think a bit of buzz around renewal time is good. The best new signups come from referrals, and the best time for referrals is shortly after a customer has made the decision to pay for the service.

Then I don't get it: According to what we can see, in March 2014 they already should be "hitting it" (1 year after the initial March 2013 spike), but it looks pretty bleak to me.

Maybe the two graph lines are on different scales?

Otherwise, they're delusional.

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