# Did the SDMB ever recover from charging to post? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 23, 2014, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324 "2014-03-23T00:08:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/21 "2014-03-23T12:07:04Z")
I think the **SDMB** was the greatest place on the Internet until 2009 when **Dave Hartwick** joined. Then it became utter crap. Prior to that it was like the internet Garden of Eden. Apart from the requirement that anyone who didn’t fit the mold be driven away. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/22 "2014-03-23T13:51:05Z")
> [@Shakes](#): > > That’s one heck of a memory gap there **Musicat**! 🙂 I guess I was thinking of a charge to post _per post,_ not _to subscribe._ ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/23 "2014-03-23T17:20:17Z")
We’re a much sexier bunch now, that’s for sure. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/24 "2014-03-23T17:39:48Z")
It was always absurdly cheap (like $8 or $15 annually) and the money (IIRC) was primarily just for the hardware and admin costs. It always struck me as nonsensical that someone would dump countless hours of their valuable time into reading and posting and when asked to support the board with a miniscule amount of money would act like they were being mugged or that the 2 to 3 penny a day cost would be a severe and intolerable financial strain. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/25 "2014-03-23T17:40:40Z")
To, me there’s not a whole huge lot of difference from when I started posting here in 2000 (shit, it’s already been almost 14 _years_? Wow.) The main thing I notice is that posting became more tightly moderated over the years, and posting rules seem to be stricter, but I don’t notice a substantive change in relation to before and after the brief “pay to post” model was implemented (and, frankly, I don’t even remember when that was or how long it lasted.) ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/26 "2014-03-23T22:48:04Z")
One mistake, at least to me: Either charge to post or take it out in copyright. If I’m paying you for the space, it is my publication. Charging people to submit material on which you then claim copyright was double-dipping. And the number of “Have the Boards Declined Since Pay-to-Post?” threads got downright embarrassing. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/27 "2014-03-23T23:00:50Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > One mistake, at least to me: > > Either charge to post or take it out in copyright. > > If I’m paying you for the space, it is my publication. Charging people to submit material on which you then claim copyright was double-dipping. It’s not as if the site owners made any money from republishing posts on the board. Can you cite any examples? ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/28 "2014-03-23T23:12:17Z")
I never said anyone was harmed or unjustly enriched - I said it was a mistake to to both. Poor form, off-putting - that sort of thing. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/29 "2014-03-23T23:34:06Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > It’s not as if the site owners made any money from republishing posts on the board. Can you cite any examples? Not monetary as such, but it (I believe) effectively meant that every short story or bit of poetry you put up on the SDMB when we were doing collections of such, that you were giving up sole ownership rights and the SDMB had full license to use that submitted work as it saw fit. Not that you would have every gotten paid for your deathless prose but it did seem a little over reaching to me. I still submitted. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/30 "2014-03-23T23:39:19Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I’ve been here 15 years. It goes in waves of really great content, and really weak content, in random cycles. I think the waves of content actually flow from week-to-week. There are some weeks when I’ll post 100 times on a wide variety of topics. And then a few weeks later, I’ll realize that all of my notifications are for those same topics and that I haven’t posted to a new topic in a long time. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2014, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/31 "2014-03-23T23:57:57Z")
Okay, I keep seeing different claims on this. Did the SDMB limit posting to paid subscribers for a time, or did it not? I’ve gotten answers that deny this, but with a snarkiness that belies the validity of the answer. I was here very early on, obviously, but left when it became pay-to-play, and took a while to get over that ‘disbarment’ even though it was a brief time (or so I recall). I really should be a Charter Member, but I missed the window due to having been driven away by PtP. I would have subscribed for the nominal privileges now granted, but pay-to-post was just too much and (as the props found out) too limiting to the community. The options now are a good balance; I wish I’d had them (known about them) in the Charter era. ---
**Author:** ![ThisUsernameIsForbidden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b4bc9f/32.png) [@ThisUsernameIsForbidden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThisUsernameIsForbidden)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/32 "2014-03-24T00:30:57Z")
Isn’t there a pay to join forum somewhere that is fairly popular? ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/33 "2014-03-24T00:37:43Z")
> [@ThisUsernameIsForbidden](#): > > Isn’t there a pay to join forum somewhere that is fairly popular? You can be a Total Farker ([Fark.com](http://Fark.com)) for the wee price of $5 a month. That’s a _month_, not a year, but a _month_. And they are much larger than the Dope is. ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/34 "2014-03-24T05:42:58Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Okay, I keep seeing different claims on this. Did the SDMB limit posting to paid subscribers for a time, or did it not? I’ve gotten answers that deny this, but with a snarkiness that belies the validity of the answer. > … Did you not read post 17? This is not a tl;dr thread, in my estimation. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/35 "2014-03-24T11:04:54Z")
You know, if this is a stunted, worse version of the SDMB… Well, it’s still _the best_ forum I have ever seen (with perhaps exception of [Randi.org](http://Randi.org)’s, which has refused my application like three times now) in terms of rational discussion, overall tone, tolerance of nutbags, and the like. You know, the things that matter in a forum. ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/36 "2014-03-24T11:23:46Z")
I think it’s gotten less fun and whimsical as it’s gotten more partisan, but I guess that’s a reflection of the U.S. as a whole. Frankly, I think the worse thing that happened to SDMB was sanitizing The Pit. To me, it’s akin to scrubbing down Manhattan with bleach. You’d think that smelling clean would be an enhancement, 'til you realize that the mild stench of urine is actually part of its charm. ---
**Author:** ![DrumBum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e79b87/32.png) [@DrumBum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrumBum)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/37 "2014-03-24T12:53:26Z")
Well, I don’t recall having to worry about squids when I joined. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/38 "2014-03-24T13:12:32Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Did you not read post 17? > > This is not a tl;dr thread, in my estimation. There _was_ no post 17 until you put it there. :dubious: (I did not realize PTP went on so long. Explains why I was elsewhere, though.) ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/39 "2014-03-24T14:44:01Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > There _was_ no post 17 until you put it there. :dubious: Bwuh? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2014, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324/40 "2014-03-24T14:54:34Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Bwuh? _Hyuuumurrrr._ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-sdmb-ever-recover-from-charging-to-post/684324.md?page=3)