Howdy-
I have no clue if this is old news or not, but I ran across a website that uses Amazon.com to get a few extra bucks to help keep it running. I thought it might be an option for the SDMB to help it get some changes done or speed up or ???
Here is a link:
http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/subst/fx/help/payor-faq.html/ref=zm_pb_h_01/102-1614272-4161763#what-is-amazon-honor-system
What say you?
Hope this helps-
-Tcat
Cranky Critic, a movie review site, uses the Amazon honor system to help keep up costs, but that site is also heavily affiliated with Amazon. I’ve seen it a couple of other places, usually Amazon affiliates, and always with some Amazon advertising involved.
I’ve read about the Amazon Honor System. I believe some people have used the money for good-fuckedcompany.com used the money for a fund for, I think, some people who were killed in an accident at a company of some sort.
One of the funniest uses I’ve seen (done just as a joke) was a humor site that had theirs say something like “We know your name. Give us money and we’ll stop spying on you.”
According to Rick from Onlineonslaught.com, the honor system thing is totally separate from any Amazon ads. It really seems like a simple way to funnel voluntary donations from a site’s users to a site. You pay Amazon via credit card, Amazon pays the site.
Rick doesn’t have a big readership outside of US/Canada, so he wasn’t positive that it worked for users outside of North America.
If the powers that run the board are interested in accepting voluntary donations as a trial step before total subscription service, this seems like it might be a good way to go, and I would like to hear that the administrators at least looked into it before deciding on making the board a strickly subscription service…
-lv
LordVor - there have been several long and extensive discussions regarding possible avenues for the Chicago Reader to obtain funds to help pay for the message board, which has been so far offered for free for several years. If time permits I will try to find some of those threads later on. I’m pretty sure your idea was discussed previously but I forget the outcome.
The SDMB staff have passed on many of your ideas to the Chicago Reader. I imagine (but don’t know for sure) that the Chicago Reader, being an alternative weekly, has several staff members knowledgeable with methods of gaining revenue through advertising, so many of the ideas our members can come up with will probably already have been considered by them.
As far as switching to a “pay to post” system - the discussion of if/how/when to implement that has been delayed by the recent server problems experienced by the SDMB. When we do have anything that we can officially announce be assured that we will let the membership know.
Arnold,
A search for Amazon Honor System for the past year in this forum came up blank except for this thread, which is why I reopened it (since nobody in charge had anything to say). I just wanted to make sure that it was discussed…
-lv
LordVor, please don’t think I am trying to discourage you. We appreciate all the generous impulses from our members. Perhaps I misremember and it wasn’t discussed on the board, but only in staff discussions. I do distinctly remember that this idea was suggested to the powers that be at the Chicago Reader.