Info Donations Discussion thread

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Here's my opinion:

I think making the gallery and journal pay services is a terrible idea, at least while they are in their current form. Sure, we could pay to use the gallery and journal, but why do that when you could sign up with Photobucket and Livejournal, respectively, for free and with many, many more features? We'd have to add enough features so it would be worth it, and that would take a lot of effort, although it might be rewarding in the end. Right now, people use the gallery and journal because it's free and convenient to use between browsing Bluelight -- definitely not for the features. For these things to be worth the cost of admission, they definitely need a massive overhaul.

Even with the social forums, I don't know if suddenly cutting them off from everyone would work. I guarantee that we'd lose a lot of people. There's definitely plenty of free forums out there that have the same sort of content. I guess it just boils down to the fact that you can't compete with free.

Is there an alternative? God, I have no idea right now. I'll keep thinking, though.
 
Indelibleface said:
Here's my opinion:

I think making the gallery and journal pay services is a terrible idea, at least while they are in their current form. Sure, we could pay to use the gallery and journal, but why do that when you could sign up with Photobucket and Livejournal, respectively, for free and with many, many more features? We'd have to add enough features so it would be worth it, and that would take a lot of effort, although it might be rewarding in the end. Right now, people use the gallery and journal because it's free and convenient to use between browsing Bluelight -- definitely not for the features. For these things to be worth the cost of admission, they definitely need a massive overhaul.

Even with the social forums, I don't know if suddenly cutting them off from everyone would work. I guarantee that we'd lose a lot of people. There's definitely plenty of free forums out there that have the same sort of content. I guess it just boils down to the fact that you can't compete with free.
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Agreed on all points.

The hournal/gallery features wouldn't survive a subscription of donation policy. I don't think there'd be enough demand.
 
SA said:
Winding Vines, I'm really attached to that old logo as well. I have it saved in several sizes on an old hard drive in the hopes that it might end up on one of my T-shirts some day too. I can chat to frizz or whoever may be taking over that channel to see how feasible it is to revive that bulb. :)
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Thank you!



Please let me know if anything comes up I could lend assistance with.

This is just a thought, and I honestly have no idea where I am going with it, but I'll go ahead shamelessly anyway.

There are a number of universities (specially CU in my city) who have a lot of issues with their student population ODing (big surprise), so it would be in their best interest to have some sort of harm reduction.
There are public boards all over the city that I could tag a flyer round about, that do not have to be Uni approved.

Just a flyer kind of like, crap someone used to make little note cards and pass them out at raves/parties with simple facts/misconceptions for harm reduction and then outline donations are greatly appreciated.

eh its a thought.

I mean even the local alternative radio station here is all about supporting avant garde and various organizations, and would most likely put a banner on their site.


One more thing: If anyone wants to help I could submit an editorial about BL in Boulder's newspaper? Which is now owned by scripts so all of the newspapers in the country could very well publish the article as well.

/ends thoughtless thinking.


Anyone need some help with ideas hit me up, i got the curse of the muse. hehe.

And thanks for reading my dribble. ;)

EDIT: BTW How is the fund situation honestly?

am i allowed to ask? haha
 
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After this I will shut my cake hole with ideas..

I know this sounds really dumb, but it is a way to get publicity, myspace, facebook other various silly social sites.

As well as NORML would probably be fairly happy to put a banner or link, something.
 
It may be in bad taste to ask but may I ask how much it costs to run a site like this (each month)? I noticed donations are paid in Euros? I'm from Canada, what's the dollar worth? I can't think of a better way for me to spend my earnings once all the bills are paid.
 
sufferingwife3 said:
It may be in bad taste to ask but may I ask how much it costs to run a site like this (each month)? I noticed donations are paid in Euros? I'm from Canada, what's the dollar worth? I can't think of a better way for me to spend my earnings once all the bills are paid.
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XE gives the most recent exchange rates. :)
 
Regarding closing down social or non-drug forums:

Bad bad bad bad bad idea. I have no stats to back this up, but I'd guess that the people that really care enough about bluelight to donate money would have a large stake in the social aspect of bluelight. Remove these, and you'll remove a large amount of potential donations as people leave the site. Even tweaking and merging forums would have that effect, for limited savings on bandwidth. Bluelight is almost totally social for me now, but I know what the rest of the site is good for and I'd hate for any of it to go away. But take away what I still use and I'd be less inclined to pay money for something I don't (can't) use anymore. And I doubt I'd be alone on that.

Unless the goal is to reduce bandwidth to a lower level to reduce costs - but that's sorta like euthanasia really...
 
Con'Fuss'D...

In My Very, Very,
Humble
O.P.P.inion

pre: removin' services just drives people away.
a) certain people will give their las' dolla...(ish).
ba) certain people will give money when they can,
when fiscally viable fo' dem.
bb) certain people will give money when given a PRIZE!!!!
c) certain people may never give money.
d) incentives probably wont draw c),
but may entice b)'s
& c)'s,
an' give a)'s an added bonus.

D)isregard all of the above as
IT'S SHIT,
But
'The Merchandise Run'
is the best bet yet.

N.B.:
BL Vodka By The Case May Sell Very Well If Put On The Marke(t)y...

​

PEACE
UnS
:o
 
SA said:
Donations progress bar and direct banking info has been added. A good chunk of the donations to date (about half) was from a single donation from a research project. Thank you again for your contributions.
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nice one. :)

50 donors @ €10/month would keep Bluelight running relatively smoothly.
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15.80USD = 16.08CAD = 17.16AUD = 7.87GBP

i'm sure we can achieve that out of our 4000+ active posters. i would like to think so anyway...
 
what about post credits?

something like, i dunno 2 cents a post... a hundred for $2. buy 5,ooo for $75 and get some kind of merchandise.

people would think more about their posts for sure.

how does banning work on a pay site?
 
donation link said:
Our total goal currently consists of approximately €5.5K hosting costs and a general purpose slush fund (legal fund) of €1.5K.
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Is that per annum?
PIP said:
what about post credits?

something like, i dunno 2 cents a post... a hundred for $2. buy 5,ooo for $75 and get some kind of merchandise.

people would think more about their posts for sure.
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True, but I think it'd drive away our core membership and restrict the flow of HR information.
PIP said:
how does banning work on a pay site?
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Same way it does on a non-pay site.
 
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