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Why we're going to a membership

redsquirrel

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Feb 19, 2014
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Ok, a lot of this stuff has been hashed out in the other thread already so I'm not going to go into too much detail but I want to address a few things.
1. The growth of this site over the past year greatly increased the cost of maintaining this site to me. I was already spending more than I should have every year on it, but it was fun, I made lots of friends, and I could afford to do so. It's just become too much to spend on just a hobby now.
2. If you disagree with the price, you don't have to pay it. The only sections of the site that won't be available to the public (that includes non-registered guests too) are the classifieds and the contest. The classifieds were chosen because they are a service and I felt it fair to charge for a service. Additionally it will help to keep scammers out. The contest was chosen because honestly it is a lot of work to run and it is an added perk for those willing to pay for a membership.
3. People are throwing out estimates on numbers of members and how much money will be taken in off this. I'm expecting it to be much much less than anything anyone has thrown out there based off the analytics I've been tracking. Not all members are active users and not all active users will upgrade.
4. Membership was chosen because it is a way to increase the odds that the expenses of the site are covered. People often say they will do things and then they don't actually do it. I've experienced this many times on this site and if this were to happen with a donate option I'd still be in the red. After this goes live, I will be adding a donation option as well for those who wish to contribute but not to join. It's there if you want to, and you can ignore it if you want.
5. I have no interest in having sponsors for the site. To me, sponsors mean bias and the lack of transparency. I want you to come here and feel like the information you receive is open and honest. I think we all know that the past year has been tough on this site with all the vendors coming into the market. I don't know how I will adapt going forward, but if I decide to do anything with vendors at some point this site will be providing them a service and no more.
 
Ok, a lot of this stuff has been hashed out in the other thread already so I'm not going to go into too much detail but I want to address a few things.
1. The growth of this site over the past year greatly increased the cost of maintaining this site to me. I was already spending more than I should have every year on it, but it was fun, I made lots of friends, and I could afford to do so. It's just become too much to spend on just a hobby now.
2. If you disagree with the price, you don't have to pay it. The only sections of the site that won't be available to the public (that includes non-registered guests too) are the classifieds and the contest. The classifieds were chosen because they are a service and I felt it fair to charge for a service. Additionally it will help to keep scammers out. The contest was chosen because honestly it is a lot of work to run and it is an added perk for those willing to pay for a membership.
3. People are throwing out estimates on numbers of members and how much money will be taken in off this. I'm expecting it to be much much less than anything anyone has thrown out there based off the analytics I've been tracking. Not all members are active users and not all active users will upgrade.
4. Membership was chosen because it is a way to increase the odds that the expenses of the site are covered. People often say they will do things and then they don't actually do it. I've experienced this many times on this site and if this were to happen with a donate option I'd still be in the red. After this goes live, I will be adding a donation option as well for those who wish to contribute but not to join. It's there if you want to, and you can ignore it if you want.
5. I have no interest in having sponsors for the site. To me, sponsors mean bias and the lack of transparency. I want you to come here and feel like the information you receive is open and honest. I think we all know that the past year has been tough on this site with all the vendors coming into the market. I don't know how I will adapt going forward, but if I decide to do anything with vendors at some point this site will be providing them a service and no more.
sounds great i will suport this site i have learned an baught an sold alot on here god bless

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Ok, a lot of this stuff has been hashed out in the other thread already so I'm not going to go into too much detail but I want to address a few things.
1. The growth of this site over the past year greatly increased the cost of maintaining this site to me. I was already spending more than I should have every year on it, but it was fun, I made lots of friends, and I could afford to do so. It's just become too much to spend on just a hobby now.
I doubt you will but I'd love for you to clue some of these guys in on the amount of money you have been spending to keep this site up. I work in IT and know what servers and licencing cost or even AWS so I have an idea but I doubt most of these guys have a clue.
 
I doubt you will but I'd love for you to clue some of these guys in on the amount of money you have been spending to keep this site up. I work in IT and know what servers and licencing cost or even AWS so I have an idea but I doubt most of these guys have a clue.

One of our business units is HPC and cloud computing. I probably don't need to tell ya but the internet doesn't run on pixie dust and goodwill! As servers and licensing scales so does cost!
 
I doubt you will but I'd love for you to clue some of these guys in on the amount of money you have been spending to keep this site up. I work in IT and know what servers and licencing cost or even AWS so I have an idea but I doubt most of these guys have a clue.
I'd prefer not to go into details, but it's definitely in the thousands since I've started the site. This year the actual server expenses went up dramatically because I had to switch to VPS. I actually might have to upgrade my package again already. It's not just those costs too. For a long time I've had it set up as a LLC to protect myself so there are legal fees as well. In preparation for going to a membership I've been adding features to the site to try to add to the membership experience. When you put it all together, it adds up. And that is ignoring the amount of time I've put into this place. And the time that my wife gives me grief for spending here or working on it...
 
As someone who is going to pay, I would like everyone to be able to view what I'm going to sell. Like someone said on the other thread, once they pay me on paypal, it's hard for them to scam me :)
This is being taken into consideration and I'm running through some ideas now. I never said I was perfect the first time :)
 
I too hope that only members can start threads in the classifieds but non members can see and buy. The SH classifieds are really unique. I'm on a ton of hunting forums and nothing comes close to SH for classifieds. I have bought and sold so much gear on here with such ease. It's really changed things for me. I'm more willing to give gear a shot because I know I can unload it and not take a huge loss if it doesn't work out. If non-members can't see the member's listings it will really devalue the benefit of the classified. I'd hate to see that lost because that's really one of the unique things about this forum.

OK, I've said it enough times, I will now stop....I just think it would be a big mistake.
 
As someone who is going to pay, I would like everyone to be able to view what I'm going to sell. Like someone said on the other thread, once they pay me on paypal, it's hard for them to scam me :)
I agree with this. I'd be more likely to buy the membership, justify the cost because I'll make some money in the sale, if I know that everyone can see the classified. Maybe there's a way to make the classified title visible but only members can view the full threads and/or contact the seller.

I don't know if that address with the scammer problem or not.
 
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