FUNDING THE EDUCATION FORUM

[James R Gordon]

Hi all,

Since July 2014 I have made the monthly payments to Invision to maintain the Education Forum. For personal reasons I am now having difficulty continuing the payments. I will make the December and January payments -  in order to give members some space to reflect but future payments may be in flux.

At present Invision requires a monthly payment of $130:00.

Members may not recognise that funding the site each and every month can cause difficulty to ones cash-flow and this is one such occasion.

Taking over the site from John Simpkin came with obligations. It is possible to back up the site and take it elsewhere - but if we did that the result would not be the site we have today. And cutting the number of forums attached to the site would breach our obligations to John.

So it is clear that:-
The site must remain with Invision.
The site’s composition must remain as created by John Simpkin.

Are there members who feel they would like to take the forum forward? If so we would be interested in hearing their views on the future of the site.

Aside from the idea of a new owner, another option is to resurrect the Donation button. Would members find that a useful addition to the site?

The purpose of this post is to alert the membership that continual funding of the EF can  - at times - cause strains.

I am happy to listen to members view on this situation.

Thank you.

James.

[Steve Thomas]

2 hours ago, James R Gordon said:

Hi all,

 

Aside from the idea of a new owner, another option is to resurrect the Donation button. Would members find that a useful addition to the site?

I am happy to listen to members view on this situation.

Thank you.

James.

James,

 

Absolutely on a Donation button.

 

I've never used crowdfunding, but maybe that might be another option. If enough was raised, you could put it into some kind of trust and take the monthly interest and use that to pay the monthly Invision fees. Someone more knowledgeable than I could help. (if I understand it correctly, crowdfunding takes a percentage of the amount raised).

 

Steve Thomas

[Jim Hargrove]

Hi, James,

If you get a process in place, I’d try to contribute a little something, but I’m surprised at the price you have to pay for hosting the Ed Forum.  Although it is probably quite a bit smaller and less interactive, the Harvey and Lee site costs less per year than your monthly cost.  H&L is probably in the neighborhood of 250 MB in size, but I alter files on average perhaps three times a week or so.

Thank you for the effort you have made to keep this forum going.

[James R Gordon]

Hi Jim,

I am looking into creating a donational process. Hopefully it will be set up reasonably quickly. The increase from $75:00 -that was the price last year - to the present costing is a consequence of the popularity of the forum and its bandwidth. In addition I believe the present cost may. reflect the size of the forum that John set up. The EF is a substantial forum and I suspect is reflected in the monthly fee.

As a citizen of the UK I am also conscious of the effect of Brexit on the value of the pound. I hope it will not happen, but there might come such a fall in the pound that the site may well go suddenly dark if the costs are beyond what I can pay.

I hope the site can survive, but I cannot assure this forum that in the present situation in the UK that it will survive. 

If I can get the donations system up quickly that might mitigate in favour of the site surviving.

James 

[Paul Brancato]

Hi James,

i agree on a donation button. The cost of maintaining the site is a pittance if divided amongst its users. I pledge to make small donations monthly.

paul

[Cliff Varnell]

21 minutes ago, Paul Brancato said:

Hi James,

i agree on a donation button. The cost of maintaining the site is a pittance if divided amongst its users. I pledge to make small donations monthly.

paul

I'll kick in $20 a month. 

I was planning on making such a contribution to the Beto O'Rourke 2020 campaign, but money won't be his problem if he runs, so...

Edited December 3, 2018 by Cliff Varnell

[W. Niederhut]

This forum provides a valuable public service, IMO.

I also plan to donate here, and to James DiEugenio's Kennedys and King website this year.

P.S.  This site is having trouble processing my donation today.  Not sure what the glitch is.

[Steve Thomas]

53 minutes ago, James R Gordon said:

 The increase from $75:00 -that was the price last year - to the present costing is a consequence of the popularity of the forum and its bandwidth. In addition I believe the present cost may. reflect the size of the forum that John set up.

James,

 

If you are going to have a Donation button, it ought to be whatever the individual member can afford.

 

Steve Thomas

[James R Gordon]

Cliff, Thank you.

Mr. Niederhut The Donation systems has not yet been implemented. I will announce when it is up and running.

Steve, the donations system will leave it to members whether they want to donate or not and if they do to indicate how much they wish to donate. I am against a system that asks members to please donate X dollars.

James

[Cliff Varnell]

😎

Don't thank me thank Social Security and San Francisco rent control.

Life is good in socialistic America.

Edited December 3, 2018 by Cliff Varnell

[Roy Wieselquist]

Mr. Gordon,

I will gladly give $20 per month autopay starting in January.  Just let us know how.

[Ron Bulman]

I'll be happy to chip in few bucks.  Still working for living that covers the bills with a little extra sometimes.  It's a unique site that's well worth supporting.

[Andrej Stancak]

I would like to contribute with funds to cover the EF running costs. Please let us know how can we do it.

[Sandy Larsen]

I'd like to make a couple suggestion, James.

I think a donation button is a great idea. But I also think that people tend to forget to donate . And when a donate button is constantly there in front of them, people tend not to notice it after a while. (A phenomenon is known as "habituation" in psychology)

You might consider doing what the folks at Wikipedia do. The donation button is always present, but on occasion they have a fundraising campaign. Which is really nothing more than an unexpected, brightly colored box appearing that asks for a donation. After a few days the box disappears. I know this works on me.

Also, if the donation system can be set up to take automatic monthly donations, I'm pretty sure that would work out well too. I've subscribed to things that cost so little (a couple dollars monthly) that I never bothered to cancel once I was finished with them.  This can make for a nice, though modest, cash cow.

P.S. I will definitely donate. Unless you're a rich man, I don't think you should be footing the bill yourself.

 

[James R Gordon]

Thank you everyone. I agree that a donation system may well be a good first step.

I believe I may have a working Paypal donation system working. I have already donated $2 through two test attempts. each time I was directed to my receiving account. I believe you should be directed to your sending account. However it you are also directed to my receiving account I will have to correct that error.

To access the donation system click on Store and Donation See below

Image 1

There are two PayPal systems. The top one is an earlier attempt. Click on the lower one. See Image below.

Image 2

Once in you are prompted for the amount you wish to donate. See image below.

Image 3

After that you are taken to the PayPal donation and ought then to be directed to your own PayPal account through which you can make a donation.

Image 4

Hopefully this will work.

James