We are working toward breaking even on costs while still adding new features. All the money we raise goes toward those costs, which are quite lean. I've worked on this project since Dec 2020 for free, plus put a LOT of my own savings into it :)

Hope that helps, and I am happy to answer questions, and more on our mission for readers and authors -> https://building.shepherd.com/

The ads on the books-like page are clearly marked, a different color, and they are partly how we fund being alive. If we had ~3,000 members, we could remove them. Currently, we have around 800.