There are three options, pay and don’t see ads, don’t pay and see ads, and don’t pay and don’t see ads. Yes, the third is not one that TPTB want to be available, but the easy availability of appropriate add-ons means that like it or not it is an option.
Only in the **third **case is the user not contributing to the upkeep of SDMB. Ads provide for the upkeep of SDMB, so if a user chooses the second option the fact that they are viewing the ads means that they are contributing.
My story:
I was singled out for violating “the rules” regarding promoting things in your signature-line, there were (and still are) MANY, MANY violators of this rule (if you do not think it’s a rule check the little blue bar at the top of this screen).
I apparently had pissed-off the wrong people by “going to the wall” in support of a Moderator in a RSO situation and after supporting the Dope it pissed me off that I got NO support FROM the Dope but the fact is that they own the Sandbox so I dropped off the Dope until the P2P ended but I missed this place so I came back BUT I will NEVER give the Dope any of my money directly!
Now watch me get banned for this post.
If anyone is interested enough you could search my posting history by date and get (most) of the story (MANY things happened off-board).
Unclviny
You’d have to work a lot harder than this to get banned.
Is a thirty-nine year old member eligible?
Don’t be rude to me because you so easily got parted from your money.
I let mine lapse because of the neutering of the Pit, and that seems unlikely to change.
Not a chance. Like Muffin, I deliberately let mine lapse for a set of reasons.
Moderator Warning
Scissorjack, insulting other posters is not permitted outside the Pit. This post is entirely out of place in MPSIMS. It also constitutes being a jerk and threadshitting. Don’t do this again.
Colibri
Moderator
For obvious reasons, we appreciate people who subscribe and who make that kind of show of support. But people who post here as guests are not freeloading and are not stealing anything. If you read or post here without subscribing and block ads, it’s true you’re getting something for nothing and we discourage it but can’t do much about it. That’s life on the internet, I guess.
Okay, there’s some truth to this. 
Still, there’s no reason to badger people about choosing not to subscribe.
Well, lets recap a little Dope history. First, it was free. Then, they decided that they needed money so they really really really wanted people to pay to post. Then that didn’t work out so well, and they really really really wanted people to see ads. Paying members? Not so much. At least then. Now, oops, guess what? They are offering something that up until now was impossible to give, i.e., a return to Charter Member status. All for the tiny sum of 4 times what it costs to be a Charter Member.
Maybe some folks are waiting for the last shoe to drop before rolling over and kissing the missus, if you know what I mean. For all we know, non paying users could be golden again at just about any time.
What some people don’t seem to get is that paying the fee also renews your membership for two years.
So, if you’re already a paying member, you’re just paying the money you would already be paying eventually anyway.
Pay a little early to get a discount after that, plus a spiffy title immediately? Why the heck not?
Nope, I was a charter member because back then it was pay-to-post, and although I liked the title, I don’t see myself spending money when I can post for free.
Not true. I’m sure there are some vanity posters here but I come to read what others post. I click ads occasionally. As Fenris noted above, the biggest service people provide here is providing content which draws others.
I think you’re paying double the price to get the title.
I did it anyway 
No, there’s no truth to it at all. If this is a restaurant, then it’s one where you have to bring your own ingredients and cook them yourself: what you’re providing is a bare kitchen and some chairs and tables; the only reason people visit is becasue they get to see, smell and taste the meals that other patrons have prepared, with the owners hovering over the stoves and tables to occasionally yell “Take that shit outside, it’s stinking up the joint. There are rules in this restaurant, and you can’t cook that in here”.
Lobsang said:
The going standard membership rate is $15 per year.
The Charter Membership discount rate is half that, $8 per year?
The Charter Member renewal is a 2 year membership at $15 per year, or $30.
So it is a 2 year membership at regular rates, in order to earn back the previously impossible to regain title of Charter Member and the half-price membership rate from that time on.
So what is one giving up? 2 year membership at regular (as opposed to discounted) rates. If one were going to be a paid member anyway (as opposed to unpaid Guest), then you are only “losing” signing up for 2 years instead of 1 year at a time. And gaining the spiffy title and the discounted rate going forward. (I put “losing” in quotes because some people see that as a benefit.)
Now if you wonder if this board will still be here in 2 years or if you’ll still be interested in posting, then maybe it isn’t a deal for you. If you don’t care for the special title, then don’t worry about it. If you’d rather post for free than pay for membership, then ignore the offer.
But if you qualify for the offer, miss your title, would pay for membership anyway, and think the discount would be nice in addition, then sign up.
I really don’t see why it bothers some people that other people like this idea. It baffles me. Why the hate?
Apparently some just like raising a stink.
Not me. I’m still peeved that they wouldn’t give me back my CM status after lapsing for a day.
Now that I don’t have it anymore, I don’t really care anymore.
I assume and hope this wasn’t directed at me (or that you are addressing me as one of the ‘haters’) Because I’m not. I’m all for it. I was merely pointing out what I thought to be the cost to get the title back.
To be honest I really didn’t look into it in great detail. I saw that it was $30 to get a 2 year renewal and the CM title back, and thought I saw somewhere that the non-cm cost was $15, assumed that was also 2 years, therefore assumed I was paying double for the privilege of getting the title back.
Anyway. I know it’s just a title, but it’s also just £21 for a two whole years of membership of a message board unique on the internet for being both large in membership and largely free of trolls and spam. I know you can get it for free but as someone who’s benefited from being a member I consider it worth paying for.
It will have been an automatic thing. You missed a deadline so you lost the CM title. You should be peeved at yourself and not the PtB. I missed mine by about 3 days and I entirely blamed myself. (But did ask nicely via email if I could have it back, and when told “no” didn’t give it a second thought)