Baggio Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 This is what they do on the SMB... RTG started as a typical fans website but the growth mushroomed beyond our wildest expectations and now the site is hosted on a high powered dedicated server with a second dedicated backup machine and costs thousands of pounds each year to run. Without the support of our users and advertisers we could no longer bring you the site. You can now make an online donation towards the running costs of Ready To Go and the Sunderland Message Board via PayPal using your credit or debit card. With your help we can continue to improve both our message board and main web pages and ensure that RTG runs on hardware to support our massive user base. We recommend a donation of £15 from our users each year (a similar amount to what you might pay for a paper based fanzine) but all donations are welcome. If you use the message board, you can make an automated Paypal donation of between £5 and £20 by following this link. This will immediately upgrade your status to "Contributor" on the message boards. If you want to pay another amount by Paypal or use another payment method, please follow the instructions below. If you are paying via the Paypal button below and not via the automated method on the message boards please ensure you enter your message board name (if any) on the 2nd payment page so that we may acknowledge your contribution. Just a simple "Contributor" title put by your name somewhere, other clubs do it too (West Ham, Spurs and Chelsea that I know of) and it doesn't cause any friction or a tier level in posters, people will think more of you if you make decent posts rather than having a star or something next to your name. Another thing I'd like to mention is the admin seem slightly embarrassed at having to post and ask for money, don't be, you as well as everyone who posts on here has helped contribute to putting together a cracking site, easily the best for football chat on the net IMO and I don't think it's much to ask of people to put their hand in their pocket to help make the forum run better. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest microbar Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Hello Mr Ashley Would you be willing to donate to Newcastle-Online? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJ_NUFC Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Nah, stick to the original idea. Donations should be anonymous and no privileges should be given to those who donate over those who don't. We don't want a fucking exclusive club, just a small number of people who care enough keep the whole thing going, and everyone is open to play their part. This is ours, yours and hopefully for a whole new generation of boys and girls. Those who can afford to and are willing to will just nudge the thing along whenever they wish. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Razor Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Yeh i would donate, i do think there should be some sort of privelidge for donaters, even a name colour change like the moderators have, it happens on most other fourms but i realise you want to keep segregation out. You could look at advertising but it's a pain for constant users and degrades the look of the site. The majority of users don't even post often (from searching users), so people who post the most are likely gonna be the donaters...... Also what kinda cost we talking about here? The old aussie dollar might get swept away And Paypal is a great idea, safe n secure Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJ_NUFC Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 I think people should be allowed to donate $1 if they wish to. I won't, but keeping minimums would only discourage users from ever giving more, or at all. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Raf Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Ive got a shit load of space on my rented server...Dreamhost. Very reliable sever with loads of space & bandwidth..... NOL can have it for free Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest exilim Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 I think donators getting a coloured name / contributor status would be fair to them. Not like they could ban anyone in the forum with those priviledges. But seriously, if you get what you get for not paying, why would you even want to donate 1p? And of course, i would expect the server to have more features other than just being stable at peak hours. Donators from asia log in during non-peak hours since most of you are from UK. So what do those people get for donating? Well the additional features i am talking about is probably just like having our own fantasy online league within this forum, or other league systems that would allow us to participate non-competitively. There is this competition at asianbookie.com where they place Asianbookie credits given to them to bet on matches (Non-real $$), and would then have the top 100 tipsters within the forum. (League System). If you want to know what i am talking about, it can be found here. http://fun.asianbookie.com/ Don't know if any mods/admin will consider this but just some ideas. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ToonTastic Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Just in case anyone doesn't fancy donating there are google ads down the right of the screen at www.newcastle-online.com they are what currently pay for the server. Is your Dreamhost server a dedicated server ? If not it's no good really. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 I don't want to start a mass argument here - and i'm not sure what the other mods think as yet - but personally i'm slightly perturbed by the fact that some people seem to want something in return, be it a title or a star or whatever. Doesn't that kind of go against what a donation is all about? You would know for yourself that you had helped to pay for the upkeep of the site you use. Isn't that enough? It is for me, like. As has been pointed out before (and in the original post), there would be NO minimum donation amount. Anyone could donate as little or as much as they liked. Dunno why people keep missing this. Also, the ideas for adverts etc are welcome but as I said in the OP, these proposed donations are about getting a start. The other methods of maintaining the site can (and will) come later. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martin Lol Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 This is what they do on the SMB... RTG started as a typical fans website but the growth mushroomed beyond our wildest expectations and now the site is hosted on a high powered dedicated server with a second dedicated backup machine and costs thousands of pounds each year to run. Without the support of our users and advertisers we could no longer bring you the site. You can now make an online donation towards the running costs of Ready To Go and the Sunderland Message Board via PayPal using your credit or debit card. With your help we can continue to improve both our message board and main web pages and ensure that RTG runs on hardware to support our massive user base. We recommend a donation of £15 from our users each year (a similar amount to what you might pay for a paper based fanzine) but all donations are welcome. If you use the message board, you can make an automated Paypal donation of between £5 and £20 by following this link. This will immediately upgrade your status to "Contributor" on the message boards. If you want to pay another amount by Paypal or use another payment method, please follow the instructions below. If you are paying via the Paypal button below and not via the automated method on the message boards please ensure you enter your message board name (if any) on the 2nd payment page so that we may acknowledge your contribution. Just a simple "Contributor" title put by your name somewhere, other clubs do it too (West Ham, Spurs and Chelsea that I know of) and it doesn't cause any friction or a tier level in posters, people will think more of you if you make decent posts rather than having a star or something next to your name. Another thing I'd like to mention is the admin seem slightly embarrassed at having to post and ask for money, don't be, you as well as everyone who posts on here has helped contribute to putting together a cracking site, easily the best for football chat on the net IMO and I don't think it's much to ask of people to put their hand in their pocket to help make the forum run better. :clap: I sponsor COYS and get a 'Sponsor' badge under my name. We get the periodical request for sponsors in the forum, a couple of times a year maybe, but there's no pressure to donate and no friction from any area if you do or you don't, the simple truth is that some people due to their personal circumstances are unable to make a donation even if they would dearly love to. The badge isn't a 'look at me,see what I've done' symbol, maybe a third of the contributors to the forum sponsor so a badge isn't special, it's simply a recognition that you enjoy visiting the forum and want its high standard to be maintained. If there is a lack of income to support a suitable server and you don't want advertising, another thought is limiting access at the busy times of the year ie during the transfer windows. COYS operate a temporary cull of lurkers and F5 pushers during the windows, it may sound harsh but a top quality service is provided for those that do have access throughout what are notoriously busy periods. A forum can only be as good as its contributors, it's the lurkers that use the bandwidth but contribute nothing to the forum so I have no problem with a temporary cull. Sponsors however, even lurkers, retain access throughout and maybe it is those individuals who would have the most to gain from making a modest donation. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Yeah but Spurs are shit. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Jay Sea Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 I'm with Baggio and Martin Jol on this. Way to go I think. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Gemmill Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Dave, set the paypal thing up, stick a donate button up, and see what happens. The request is out there in the form of this thread, some have said they will donate, some have said they won't. I would just put the thing up and see what happens. You might be surprised with how much you get in. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Dave, set the paypal thing up, stick a donate button up, and see what happens. The request is out there in the form of this thread, some have said they will donate, some have said they won't. I would just put the thing up and see what happens. You might be surprised with how much you get in. We might well do just that. It's all ready to go, we just had some problems programming the button in last time we tried. As in it fucked the whole site. I know nothing about it though, so don't ask me. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Gemmill Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 You're not letting Sharkboy do it, are you? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
NG32 Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Yep, i'd chuck in a tenner now and then. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 You're not letting Sharkboy do it, are you? Certainly not. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Munkey Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 aye, i'll contribute to the site. it's one of the main ways for me to ward off boredom at work, so will be happy to chip in a bit. think it should be kept anonymous and at people's discretion Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Verlaine Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 I think I give enough back every time I post, tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
NG32 Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 aye, i'll contribute to the site. it's one of the main ways for me to ward off boredom at work, so will be happy to chip in a bit. Aye think it should be kept anonymous and at people's discretion yep. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Invicta_Toon Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 I'm with Dave on this one. Spurs are shit. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Invicta_Toon Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 so at the current vote level (68 for), you need each contributor to donate just under £15 each to fund a £1k a year server Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 so at the current vote level (68 for), you need each contributor to donate just under £15 each to fund a £1k a year server A rather simplistic view. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Invicta_Toon Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 so at the current vote level (68 for), you need each contributor to donate just under £15 each to fund a £1k a year server A rather simplistic view. how's that then? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jarralad Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Yes i`ll donate,i currently run a website myself which costs about £4000 a year all of which comes from donations from members. You`ll get the usual tight arse freeloaders who will spend the most time on the board yet wont part with one single penny. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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