The Cost of Doing Business

[$keith]

Wait, that's like... now.

[RageForJesus]

I'm pretty sure I'm paid up.  It's still a pretty sweet deal, even if I'm not 'round often.

[Geof F. Morris]

Okay, so here's the cost as it stands now:

Server rental: $324/mo. x 12 mo. = $3,888 /yr.

I've spent a few hundred bucks on other things [server tunings, license fees, etc.].  Conservatively, call it $4200.  [It's higher than that, because I've done the server tuning twice and that ran $125 each time, but Smiley generously offset part of that cost.]

I just looked at how much money I've withdrawn out of PayPal in the last year.  That's $2404.60.  There's about $97 in the account right this moment, which puts us to $2500.  I've probably taken in another $200 or so in cash and check donations outside of PayPal in the last year.  That gets us to about $2700.

Folks, I can't continue to spend $1500 a year on this.  I just can't.

GFM

[katie]

let us know what you decide, geof.  scaling back...increasing fees...something else entirely...

[david]

carwash!

[katie]

cake walk!

(what?)

[eric.]

I suspected you were paying out some for this, but not that much.

I don't think anyone here expects you to pay out anything.
Can you and Mark and perhaps some input from the bartenders figure out based on the average number of people who subscribe what it would cost to run the place here.

I would suggest charge $10/per year. Even if that was more than the cost per year I doubt it would cover the shortfall you have paid in the past.

[david]

cake walk!

(what?)

mmm...cake.

[katie]

cake walk!

(what?)

mmm...cake.

i knew i could count on you, dave. 

[Geof F. Morris]

let us know what you decide, geof.  scaling back...increasing fees...something else entirely...

Well, I have thought about this, but I just don't have an answer.  Bryan and I were talking about it on the phone earlier, which I guess was the impetus to running the numbers.  [And now the numbers are the impetus for my nausea, heh.]  One option is to shut down all the forums and just go to hosting accounts on the other stuff.  That gets a whole lot cheaper, but it also brings in zero money other than ads or donations, and ... who the hell gives donations to what is, essentially, a Weblog?  So that doesn't seem like it works to me.

[Bryan feels awful.  "I gave birth to this kid, you adopted him, and now he's really expensive."]

I looked just now: there are 114 folks paying $5/yr and 54 folks paying $25/yr.  Ignoring the losses to fees [I get $4.53 of every $5, $23.97 of every $25], if we double fees on the Subscribers [$5-->$10], that gets us ... $570, or about a third of the deficit.  Do I make the fee $25/yr across the board?  That would cover costs, and I'm still just donating my time to administer the server [which we all know isn't non-zero], but I'm okay with that.

I just don't know.  I just know that I can't continue to sustain this.

GFM

[katie]

is it the size of the forum that makes it so expensive?

(forgive my non-tech-savviness.)

[Geof F. Morris]

Even if that was more than the cost per year I doubt it would cover the shortfall you have paid in the past.

Oh, what I've spent doing this since 2003?  Hmmmm ... $7500 or so.  Of course, I had a roommate for most of that time, so that really didn't faze me a bit.  I also didn't have a car note for most of that time.

is it the size of the forum that makes it so expensive?

(forgive my non-tech-savviness.)

That's certainly part of it.  A lot of it as well is the amount of load required to keep up with the bassbowls on the Internet who try to crack boxes.

GFM

[katie]

i know we've talked before about on here about dumping the older posts on here.  no one really want that...but if it would help...?

[*dan]

You could make those with blogs pay a nominal fee for those blogs. I'd pay for that.

[Geof F. Morris]

i know we've talked before about on here about dumping the older posts on here.  no one really want that...but if it would help...?

It would help a little bit, but not that much.

You could make those with blogs pay a nominal fee for those blogs. I'd pay for that.

Sure, I could.  That's only like 50 people, though, half of whom would move to WordPress.com the moment I announced it because they don't blog enough to justify the cost.  [If they didn't drop the blog altogether, because hey ... I just dropped like 20 accounts and no one said boo.]  25 people x 12 months = 600 people-months.  Are the 25 of you going to decide that it's worth, oh, $3/mo?

GFM