And you two have been married HOW long?
I think a better way would be to have a thread where current members post their nominations for people that deserve a sponsored subscription based on posting contributions of new members (or whoever). Then you either have a vote or just tally up who got the most posts in their favor in that thread. This way, you’re rewarding a person or persons that has good contributions to the board with a payed membership rather than rewarding someone that just happens to know a a good joke or trivia.
Everyone please!
Quit with this talk of how cheap it is, don’t you know how a market economy works?
They’ll just raise the rates that much sooner. 
It sure beats porn subscriptions though 
Well, so much for anonymity. The Dope will now have a database of real names and cc info linked to email addy’s and usernames. Will there be any assurances that the info will not be shared or sold?
That concern aside, I’m in favor of it and plan to subscribe.
Also, there really should be a system that will allow those without paypal or plastic to mail in money orders.
I’m behind this move 100%. I love this board and use more than a $4.95/$14.95 share of it.
I’ll reiterate in case people missed it, Paypal DOES take money from Checking accounts too and actually that’s probably a better deal as I believe Paypal does charge for the credit card transactions. (Could someone confirm/deny the rumor I’m starting here?)
I’d miss the dope and would be willing to say that even if it force installed Gator/Gain on my puter to be a member, I’d do it. (But puhleeeeze don’t!)
Yes. So far we’re doing pretty well on ad revenue, so I don’t foresee going pay anytime soon.
[QUOTE=Ed Zotti]
If you sign up before Wednesday, April 21, 2004, your first year’s subscription costs an unbelievably low US $4.95. What’s more, we promise that as long as you remain a subscriber, you’ll be able to renew annually for 50% of whatever the regular rate is at the time. If you don’t sign up till after April 21, you’ll have to pay the regular rate of US $14.95, just like the newbies.
[li]The title under your name says “charter member.”[/li][/QUOTE]
This is the part that troubles me. We’re creating not just an elite, but a permanent elite. Ideally, having"charter member" under your name wouldn’t make a difference in how people consider your contribution to the discussion–but given how sensitive people already are about post count, I think it’s likely to. A brilliant writer who immediately makes a mark on the board will still always be labelled a second-tier citizen, while a long-time lacklustre poster who’s never contributed anything of particular merit will have what looks like a stamp of approval.
Could the fact that I use/post on the SDMB from 6 different computers be a problem? Ip addresses being different and such
That’s precisely what I love about it. Don’t change a thing.
But some people might prefer to just send in mail orders or checks, rather than using Paypal. Will that even be an option?
Although, I’ve already had an offer of someone willing to pay for me, with me paying them back. Thanks! I’ll keep you in mind.
::Writing down March 22 on my calendar…check after 9am::
$4.95 to stay with the best message board in the whole universe? Hell yeah!!
Does sucking up give us a discount?
I was in until…
Now I am not so sure. Does Ed have a mustache? Never mind…
US$4.95=
Canadian$6.58=
Euro 4.00=
Yen 529.16=
British Pounds 2.70=
Australian$6.59
Actually, nothing really to add except to give the “International Crowd” the latest exchange rates…
I’ve learned info worth much more than $5 a year from SDMB. This Board has experts in practically every field and many are willing to share their knowledge. For a measly $5 a year I can learn a lot (a lot more than I already have).
Does this mean that we’ll stop hearing, “Well you get what you pay for” when people pit some aspect of the board?
Just imagine what the world would be like if everyone held that belief. The socialists would be up in arms, and the investment bankers would be up to their eyes in money.
Opinion: A 30-day trial / guest membership is far too long. Most people who sign-up and don’t stick around only post during the 1st few days and split. If it was a 10-day trial, this might take more burden off the server.
Question: When word of a premium/pay-as-you go message board gets around, is there a chance that more hackers will be stopping by to pay a visit? Like hyenas to a dead carcus, I assume hackers will flock here in an attempt to cause mayhem & steal whatever it is hackers like stealing.
This sounds like an unfortunate but necessary change, as someone with some professional experience of credit card charging over the internet, I ask Ed et al to be very careful that there credit card processing company can cope well with European and other foreign credit cards, specificaly with regards to differing billing address formats and there relationship to bank approval. If they are planning to use Cybersource (company with which I am familiar with), I invite anyone from SDMB board to get in contact. PayPal is nicely global already, so should be a secondary payment route for anyone with credit card issues, but I find PayPal is a bad spam trap, and gets lots of spoofing.
I hope there is a possibility of a low-use special price, or that the free trial can be changed from 30 day period to a 30 post limit, this would allow the few very low volume but high quality posters to remain without excess cost to them, whilst stoping someone sending off huge numbers of posts in a few days from a guest account.
I have not a single problem or suggestion to improve this scheme. If anyone can’t scratch up $5 they should probably cancel the internet access. I do worry a bit about a decline in posting caused by a reduction in new members. Fortunately I have a solution.
I am a daily reader, my post count is .94 posts per day. I will post at least once per day over the next year. Everyone will be celebrating 6.4% more fruitbat!
I’m glad to hear it! And I’m especially glad to hear about the measly $5 charge. Wow.
To address RT and others who wonder why they didn’t try other forms of fundraising first: You guys know damn well that they’ve been considering this stuff for years. I think we can give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they had good reasons not to go with other options.
Sign me up.
In fact (ohmigodIamsuchakissass), can I make a donation to the SDMB along with my $4.95? I’m serious. Can’t tell you how many of those little ignorants the SDMB has helped me exterminate. I owes ya.
100 posts or 90 days, whichever comes first?