Future funding of the forum

[DejahThoris]

Top-right corner of every page.

I am amazingly unobservant sometimes...

Small donation made, but at least it's recurring!

[Strikers1945guy]

Fee wouldn't be mandatory to use / see the site, just the marketplace. That way all the lurkers with 20 posts over a 5 year period will be forced to donate if they wish to keep on scouring the marketplace.

All other places like shmup chat and strategy sections don't need a fee

[DejahThoris]

Fee wouldn't be mandatory to use / see the site, just the marketplace. That way all the lurkers with 20 posts over a 5 year period will be forced to donate if they wish to keep on scouring the marketplace.

Equally importantly, the people who only use the site to profit. I like the idea.

[ptoing]

How much HD space does this forum take up, and what is your average monthly bandwidth?

I have been running a small artforum (somewhat smaller than shmups), for almost a decade and we never paid anywhere near that yearly.
I think migrating to some option where you can setup your own server remotely (like ipxcore for example) would be a good idea, esp if you know (as you will) what kinda bandwidth you will need.

[Xonatron]

I agree with all comments about getting cheaper hosting.

A few options at DreamHost:
https://www.dreamhost.com/hosting/shared/ $8/month*
https://www.dreamhost.com/hosting/vps/ $15/month**

*A bit deceptive with pricing as (I think) it's $11/month if you do not pay for a year in advance.
**What xona.com is hosted on.

[cfx]

Fee wouldn't be mandatory to use / see the site, just the marketplace. That way all the lurkers with 20 posts over a 5 year period will be forced to donate if they wish to keep on scouring the marketplace.

All other places like shmup chat and strategy sections don't need a fee

I think this is an excellent idea and in line with what is already done here; i.e. you can't view the marketplace unless you are a member and logged in.

[Square_Air]

Fee wouldn't be mandatory to use / see the site, just the marketplace. That way all the lurkers with 20 posts over a 5 year period will be forced to donate if they wish to keep on scouring the marketplace.

All other places like shmup chat and strategy sections don't need a fee

I think this is an excellent idea and in line with what is already done here; i.e. you can't view the marketplace unless you are a member and logged in.

This + funding drive sound like pretty solid ideas. A downgrade is a good option as long as it doesn't effect the forum negatively.

[ryu]

Might as well charge all those guys with 1 post advertizing their games in the dev section

[emphatic]

Marketplace tax is a great idea!

[juji82]

What about a fundraise with some products? Whoever lives in Japan might help on this, I can find some stuff to sell on the forum and just get back what I paid of, the extra would go for hosting

[Pedro Lambrini]

I'll preface my tuppence worth by saying that I lost my job last month (and still awaiting dole) so I can't actually contribute just now. I know, I know, another interwebs sob story.

Anyway, though I haven't posted much until recently I've often visited just to keep in the shmup loop and the site has become a valuable resource of information for me. Over the years, I've seen the forum grow into quite the community. A lot of forums claim to be a great community but few really are as familial as this one. I really appreciate that. I'm sure others do too.

Now the sucking up paragraph is done, here's what I think. Another great forum I visit is Atariage. I think they've got a great balance between 'just' being a forum and offering something extra. That 'extra' is individual emotional investment. I know people often scoff at "Like" buttons but when used by a mature community I find them to be a great way of showing concurrence or support without the need of spammy posts. It also allows for quieter lurking types to feel more invested in their little part of the internet thus fueling the community vibe. On top of that, AA has a subscriber option with which one can make a donation and get, as already suggested, 'subscriber' badge on their avatar and profile.

I think that adding a 'like' button, a subscriber badge and downgrading the server would be enough to encourage forum growth and monetary income. You'll have cut costs and given people reason to financially support the forum.

Also, an annual raffle might be an idea. It's a fun thing for forum members to take part in while raising funds.

So, that's my tuppence worth.

PS: Regardless of any developments here I will make a donation as soon as my dole comes through. Like I said, I appreciate this wee forum.

[nasty_wolverine]

Might as well charge all those guys with 1 post advertizing their games in the dev section

lol

sign me up for donations or patreon.

[Rot]

Hi lads... (I know... I know... i don't play here very often...)

...The issue you'll find is unless you get members to commit a fee on a monthly basis... you'll need this sorta funding drive every year...

The issues will arise when you get when monthly paying (or even donating) members start feeling they are above the law... that's why a one site... one owner scenario works best...

Hey System11 pal... you ever consider asking Shawn about sharing a server pal? I'm sure he'd consider it...

Now matter what anyone says about Shawn.... he's a good guy... and I wouldn't have stayed so loyal to Ng.com if i didn't think otherwise...

xROTx

PS. However, if that doesn't suit you... there is another option... you find ONE partner and only one to share the fees system11 pal...

EDIT: I'd suggest someone you can get along with... £36 pcm... easy:D

[Shadowduel]

Only 20–25(paying a €5 fee monthly) people are needed to pretty much cover all the expenses.
Let's just organise this.

[Stevens]

Any chance of an ignore function being added?

[waiwainl]

Up for some form of $5-$10 a year scheme.

All talk from a lot of you above!
I just hit the Donate button and put action to my word (actually never noticed this button )

[ELabit]

You could add a donate link and encourage people selling expensive PCBs to hit the donate link when selling a $1000 PCB that they didn't have to pay ebay fees on

[neorichieb1971]

Just put a counter showing the amount paid in.

One of the reasons I no longer contribute is because I can't see if your funding the site or pocketing money.

Its just a case of transparency for me.

[DejahThoris]

I just hit the Donate button and put action to my word (actually never noticed this button )

Now there are two of us. I bet there are more. It's tiny and in an awfully obscure location on a decent-sized monitor.

I also second the idea of transparency. Good old fashioned fund-raising thermometer would be nice to see.

[Sir Arthur ahf]

2) Run a Patreon - would people sign up to this? I don't know if this would count as a second income and be taxed at the highest rate though.
4) Add 'supporter' badges as seen on some other forums.
5) Downgrading significantly to some kind of virtual server option. I'd be interested in input from people currently doing this, at the last place we did that I used to get regular nastygrams about the size of the database.

2.- We are always talking about keeping the games in the community. 1 or $2 monthly fee is not that much, and we all can support that amount. Only those people who support the Patreon will get access to the Trading Station. That way we will avoid lurkers.
4.- Let's see who's in and who's not
5.- Let´s look for a cheaper way to keep the forum alive

[system11]

I have been reading all this by the way and thanks for the input so far. It seems like formalising donations or having some kind of regular option for those who want it, is going to complicate things for me personally as they'd count as taxable income. Which is fucking insane, but the UK is fucking insane.

It seems the most viable option is to hunt around for someone who wants to share on hosting. I priced up an Amazon EC2 instance of a relatively comparable size (well, half...) and the saving was so small it wasn't worth the hit in security and performance.

A guy at work actually does hosting, and we're talking about maybe moving it to his place but I have concerns over reliability there. Also talking to one person about a hosting share.

Just thought I'd let you know, and many thanks to the people who threw some donations in.

Oh, and can you guys please stop fighting? And no - I'm not putting an ignore function in because it's childish and leads to disjointed conversations.

[Strikers1945guy]

Just put a counter showing the amount paid in.

One of the reasons I no longer contribute is because I can't see if your funding the site or pocketing money.

Its just a case of transparency for me.

After all these years of funding the forum completely on his own, and the way he has helped countless people with their hardware I think it's safe to say he's not pocketing anything. He's a stand up guy.

[NickPalmerDegica]

I have been reading all this by the way and thanks for the input so far. It seems like formalising donations or having some kind of regular option for those who want it, is going to complicate things for me personally as they'd count as taxable income. Which is fucking insane, but the UK is fucking insane.

Can you claim the forums as a business, and then you could count the cost of the forum hosting as a business expense, which counts as a tax deduction. At least, that is how it works in the US. I don't know enough about tax law in the UK, but its probably similar? Maybe? I don't know though. (I know I get to claim a lot of things on my US taxes because of the way my income is setup, such as the cost of my computer, and internet and etc)

Also, I think that my boss sent you an email about this, can you check and see if you have it? If not, please message me. We would like to find a way to help keep you guys alive without anyone being burdened too much.

[electricgrave]

I'm down to help , just made a donation. I know I don't frequent the place enough but it has been awesome to me and if I can help I'd be more than happy to.

[kuze]

What are the specs on the current server?

[system11]

Just put a counter showing the amount paid in.

One of the reasons I no longer contribute is because I can't see if your funding the site or pocketing money.

Its just a case of transparency for me.

Fuck you.

Total donations across 2014 & 2015: £256.85 (actually less due to the exchange rate changing, thats in todays money with a low pound)
Total costs from my pocket on hosting across 2014 & 2015: £1728

You need to sit down and think about your general mistrust of other people, this is actually the most insulting thing anyone has ever posted in my general direction on this forum, ever.

[system11]

What are the specs on the current server?

32gb (mirrored) => 16gb
2x quad 2.26ghz (hyperthreading on) => 16 logical cores
4x 146gb raid 10 => ~300gb storage

It wouldn't materially affect performance to have half of the above.

[parodius]

Not sure if I ever donated.
I just did.

Agree that you probably should try to move the forum to some kind of cloud service.
Very likely to be cheaper to run.

[Pedro Lambrini]

I know this is probably a bit pie in the sky and more work than you'd probably like but have you thought about merch?

T shirts like the ones pixelcorps made years ago or 1CC make now? If, for arguments sake, it cost £15 print and post a shirt you could sell them at cost (therefore just a 'hobby' still) but ask for a £5 donation rounding the 'price' up to £20. Maybe even posters or whatever the kids are into these days...

We'd get lovely things and you'd get donations.

[Rot]

heh...

System11 man... you or one of your staff went through a LOT of effort... to edit the last few pages...

xROTx

PS. Meh.... your forum... your rules...