Info Donations Discussion thread

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Good point, and we have indeed updated our donation bar. As everyone can see, we've had a really good response from some of our members in these few weeks, but with one week remaining we find ourselves still ~700 euro short :\

Just as a quick summary, we had the following donations in recent weeks:


USD ~250 euro (from 17 donors, for about 20 USD on average)
AUSD ~300 euro (from 8 donors, for about 48 AUSD on average)
GBP ~45 euro (from 4 donors, for about 10 GBP each)
Euro ~120 euro (from 6 donors, for about 20 euro each)

~35 donors...out of 178,000+ accounts? That's fairly disappointing, but we're ever grateful for those who have given. Especially as they have helped us nearly halve the outstanding 2010 debt.

We don't have final word on the calendar and poster sales, but I see last count was ~20 calendars and 4 posters sold, of which we get a relatively small cut from the ~$22 USD price on each. :\ Likewise, we're awaiting word from Inflexxion on when we've reached the desired number of respondents in their survey such that we can conclude this study and receive the monies from that partnership effort.

In the meantime, that leaves us with very little time and still a rather large, outstanding debt. We're in talks with our host regarding what happens if we come up short still for the 2010 services rendered. The site shouldn't go offline, but we need your help not to even put that in question. Again, our thanks to all who give - money, time, or effort - to keep this place alive and what it is. Thank you all.
 
i think its useful that you posted just how few people donated. because its rather easy to just ignore it and assume that everyone else will donate. now its obvious that almost no one donates :\
 
I am guessing that people are missing out on the inflexxion study. If you turned that banner the same colors as the festivus forum it would probably get a lot more attention!
 
How about accepting amazon payments? or maybe even amazon gift certificates, although I don't know if the latter can be turned into cash or anything useful for the site.
 
What do you mean "amazon payments"? Do they have some kind of payment system?
 
I'm curious to see some updated stats when you guys have a chance!!

Also, I may have missed this but how much do we stand to make from the Inflexxion study?
 
^The stats bar was updated fairly recently, so it should be close to accurate at the moment.

abra, I was not aware of that at all! Thanks for bringing it to our attention :)
 
Updated stats bar - in the past week we've gotten an additional:

USD ~245 euro (from 8 donors, for about 41 USD on average)
GBP ~12 euro (from 2 donors, for about 5 GBP each)


That is including all donations to date, but not all have 'cleared' the banking hold (I counted them, assuming they will clear). We gave a date of JAN 15 as a closing date, hoping to have any bank holds cleared within the next week or so....but we also hoped to have enough to cover the bill, and obviously we don't. At least, not on the donations of the very few generous people who gave (you have our thanks). It may take a few days before we can take down our donation page, so if you see it still available, consider that an opportunity to still give. But it should be coming down at any time with no more warning than what I'm giving you here.

Why are we shutting down the donation page when we obviously still need money? We're transitioning our banking and need to close down the current account as we activate a new one. Expect that the donation page may become available once we have the new account online and the kinks worked out.

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I need to get in touch with chrissie to see how much the Calendars and Posters earned us, and I suspect those will remain available going forward.

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The Inflexxion study is NOT closing on the same date....that is open until they reach the required number of responses. We're awaiting word from them on how close we are to that magic number, however they were initially very pleased with the number of responses they were getting despite the noted difficulty several of our members experienced in taking it. Unfortunately, once they started looking into the responses, they found where people had obviously taken it multiple times - just trying to help us out, with the best of intentions, but as such those entries had to be taken out of the data sample and setting us back significantly on the number of valid responses we've directed their way. We're working with Sebastian's Ghost and the Inflexxion staff to wrap this up in a way that meets their needs, including working up a banner to catch people's eye and whatever else we can do to send responses their way.

There is the question raised of "How much money is Inflexxion giving?" They have helped out significantly in the past, and are promising a good return on this study as well. We (the admin) have held back on publicly stating "How much?" because we hope to get similar opportunities with other research groups needing access to a group like our membership, and we don't want to bias our opportunities with those entities by selling ourselves short, or setting it an amount to high and scaring them off. This really isn't a known market, so 'value' is debateable. That said, we (the admin) can tell you that for this survey alone, we would clear our remaining debt for 2010 and get a good start on 2011's first quarter payment. We can also state that SG is working on our behalf to set up a deal for next year with them to run several surveys (agreed dollar amounts, number of surveys and respondents) so we can go into this with a better financial foundation than we've operated with to this point. That said, with Inflexxion alone, we won't make it - we'll still need member donations and other fund raising events (we are looking at a premium usergroup, as well as merchandising, and of course the 'one off' donations we've accepted to this point). However, those hinge on a) getting our new banking set up and operational, and b ) the continued patience of our host....which is really unfair to ask of them.

I'll make a similar statement in the discussion thread for the survey in Drug Studies.

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Amazon money? Changing banking? What's up with this stuff...huh?

Ok, as outlined earlier in the thread, we are limited in the online banking opportunities we have, given our content and geography issues, combined with the strong desire for people to retain their privacy (which I'm sure you would all agree is understandable). There are reasons behind changing the banking, which for the privacy reasons of the people involved we'd prefer not to state - but we can assure you NOBODY is running off with any funds, and in fact those involved have discussed covering the remaining difference just to ease the transition....but it's still too much for the few involved to foot the full bill. Once we get the changes made, we can hopefully offer a better, more informative response, but for now - this is what drove our JAN 15 date, and why the donation page will be offline for a bit. If anyone is concerned about misuse of the money, or theft, well....there's not much more we can do beyond showing you 10 yrs of keeping the site online, reporting to you the amounts the donations are bringing in, and what our actual expenses are for each year. We're trying to remain as transparent as possible, but still respect the privacy of those who donate, and those who put their names on the accounts. Beyond that, you have to trust us. Anyone who's met any of us admin will know we're not getting rich, or even high for an evening, with the money the site brings in. :\

As to Amazon money, or Google money, or other alternatives we say thank you for the suggestion. However, we've explored them and they won't work for our site. I know johboy spent days going over the options awhile back (when the donation drives first started), and I've done the same recently. We really are handcuffed on our options. If they don't work for you individually, we're sorry, and we'll try to work with you however we can, but we have what we have.
 
fizzle said:
^The stats bar was updated fairly recently, so it should be close to accurate at the moment.
Click to expand...

I was just curious, as it had been several days and the posted end date for the donation push had passed.

Ok, ok I mostly just wanted to see the bar move up after I donated ;)

Thanks so much for the update, TLB! Glad to see we're getting closer to the goal.
 
Donated, bought a calendar (very nice) and also provided my debit card services to those who didn't have access to one, which sold a few more.
Like many, I felt I owed this site a debt. Good luck guys.
 
Yeah, although I haven't been very active in recent years, Bluelight has helped me a lot throughout the years.. I felt I owed the site a little something :)
 
I remember when I first entered this site in high school...I knew so much more than other kids in school about the whole drug culture, and I knew smart ways thanks to this site. And to the people who came to this site.... I def owe this site some money. I will donate when I get my next paycheck, I hope everyone who has been here over 5 years would do the same, if they have it!!!!!! I wouldnt donate to some of the attitutdes I've dealt with over the years here, but the knowledge gained much outweighs some attitudes.

Much luv bluelight,

Smoke
 
How would I go about buying poster/calender as well?? Maybe I need glasses because I canooot see how to!
 
I believe there are links in the lounge for that... I'll find you one in a bit.
 
Many Thanks!!

Donation #1 was just made, just a small one. and next week should be able to put a few more up, PM me with the link if you can Fizzle, thanks again !
 
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