The problem with paid placement
Every launch site has to pay its bills, and the easiest way is to sell position: pay more, rank higher. It works for the site for a while. Then visitors notice that the top of the board is whoever paid, makers notice that launching for free is pointless, and the board stops meaning anything. A ranking you can buy isn't a ranking, it's a price list.
So we made one rule and built everything else around it: only votes rank a launch. Money can buy a date, our time, or a labelled space next to the board. It can't buy a place on it. Every paid product we sell was designed backwards from that rule, and when an idea for a new one can't be squared with it, we don't build it.
That doesn't make us neutral about money. We need it, and we'd like the site to be a good business. The point is that the board is the thing that makes launching here worth anything, so protecting it is part of running the business well, not a cost to it.
What money buys
A paid pick buys a date
A books the week you choose instead of waiting in the free queue. It's for makers who need a particular date: a press day, a conference, a release they've already announced. Picks come from their own spots each week, so they never push a free launch back.1
A picked launch starts at zero votes on Monday and is ranked exactly like a free one. It also gets a link from its launch page, because a business paying for a date is a reasonable sign it's a real one, and its launch page carries no ads. Neither of those touches the ranking.
A review buys our time
A paid review buys a hands-on test, not a verdict. We use the product on real work, score it and compare it with alternatives. The maker doesn't see the review before it's published, can't change the score, and the review says at the top that it was paid for.3 If we can't review a product because it doesn't work or isn't a real product, we refund in full.
An ad buys a labelled space
Sponsors can book a in the board, a spot in the sidebar, or the single sponsor line in the weekly newsletter. Every one of them is labelled, every link carries rel="sponsored" so search engines know it's paid, and none of them ever gets votes, a rank or a place in the archive.2
Labelling isn't a formality. An ad that looks like a launch borrows trust from the ranking around it, and every visitor who mistakes one for the other trusts the board a little less afterwards. Making ads look like ads is how we keep the launches around them believable, and sponsors get readers who clicked because they were interested, not because they were misled.
We also review every ad before it runs, and say no to products we wouldn't use ourselves. If a slot isn't booked, nothing runs there: no filler ads and no repeats of last week's sponsors. At most there's a note that the space is open.
What money never buys
- A higher rank, or any votes.
- A better position within a week: all of a week's launches go live at the same moment.
- A score on a review, or a look at the review before it's published.
- A place in the archive for an ad.
- A way around the rules everyone else follows, such as the gap before a product can launch again.
That last one matters more than it looks. Rules that only apply to people who don't pay aren't rules, and makers can tell. A paid pick books a date inside the same rules as a free launch: it doesn't shorten the wait before a relaunch, and it doesn't take a spot from the free queue.
How you can check
You don't have to take our word for any of this. A closed week in the archive shows every launch in the order it finished, with its vote count. Paid picks aren't hidden: you can compare where they finished with everyone else. Sponsored cards are visibly labelled on every page they appear on, and their links are marked as sponsored in the page source.
If you ever see something that looks like money moving a launch, tell us through the support page. We'd rather hear about a mistake than have someone quietly lose trust in the board.
What this means if you're launching
If you launch for free, you're on the same board, under the same rules, as everyone who paid. The only things you give up are choosing your week and the dofollow link. If you're deciding whether to pay, ask whether the date matters to you. If it doesn't, the free queue gets you the same chance at the same ranking; paying won't buy a better one.
Why it's worth the trade-off
Selling rank would make more money sooner. We think it would also make the board worthless, and a worthless board can't sell anything for long. A ranking people trust is what makes a launch here worth having, which is what makes picks, reviews and ads worth buying in the first place. Keeping them apart isn't a sacrifice; it's the business.
Everything we charge for, and what it includes, is on the pricing page. If you're launching soon, how a launch week works walks through the week from the queue to the final rank.