Author Topic: Transparency regarding donations  (Read 5473 times)

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Offline Jim Bauwens

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Transparency regarding donations
« on: October 20, 2013, 09:20:21 am »
Hi all,

I decided to create this topic after stumbling on the donation button once again (well, it's just that I don't visit the front page that often, more directly other pages). In the beginning when Omnimaga added the option to donate to support the site it showed how much was donated and by who. This was a good thing that suddenly vanished. Personally I think that a site that accepts donations from members should also be transparent towards those members on how much money is put into the site and for what it is used. I'm not saying there should be a list of all the people who donated but generally that there should be some more output towards the members on what's going on. That's in my opinion showing some respect towards the members that put effort into supporting the site.

This is just my opinion of course and is something that I wanted to say before but forgot to do so.

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #1 on: October 20, 2013, 11:06:01 am »
TI-Planet have a donators group. That could be nice to have at least a donator flag on your profile. Of course, it would give you nothing other than bragging rights.

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Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #2 on: October 20, 2013, 12:11:28 pm »
On SMF 2 there is paid membership support which lets admins automatically grant extra access to donators, but the donation amount is fixed. Something like we had would be nice, but preferably automated, so admins don't have to manually update the list every week or so.

As for donations they went to contest prizes and hosting bills, but now monthly hosting fees dropped from $85+ to $25 so I dunno where extra money would go in the future. Unlike Cemetech, Planete Casio and TI Planet, Omnimaga contests were never sponsorized or affiliated with any third party offering us the prizes, so the entire prize pool had to be funded by the staff and donators, resulting in smaller prizes most times.

Offline Adriweb

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #3 on: October 20, 2013, 12:13:38 pm »
On our (TI-Planet) sidebar, we have a list of recent donators (which I need to update - oops), but what we also do is that if the donator is a TI-Planet member, he becomes part of the "Premium" group (along with its tag/badge on each post), which on top of showing that the member supports us, has the feature of removing the ads on the website :)
« Last Edit: October 20, 2013, 02:45:04 pm by adriweb »
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Offline Jim Bauwens

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #4 on: October 20, 2013, 02:07:11 pm »
Well giving donators "premium" access is of course nice (although I don't know what that would be here on Omnimaga :P), but my point more is that people can get a bit of an idea how the money is flowing and what is happening with it. There isn't any information about that now at the moment. Of course we make good guesses but I suppose a little page on the site dedicated to it wouldn't do much harm :)
« Last Edit: October 20, 2013, 02:07:35 pm by Jim Bauwens »

Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #5 on: October 20, 2013, 06:19:44 pm »
Yeah back in 2011 I remember I got concerned about that when the admins suddenly ran out of money despite me donating quite a bunch. However it turned out that Netham45 had to pay for two servers at the time and none of the staff had money (no job). But yeah I thought this would be a good idea to explain a summary of where the donation goes on the front page. Maybe in small chars to take less space. Plus, doing so would explain Omni's motive, perhaps making some people feel more like donating in the process. This would especially be a good idea for newcomers, since not every calc site supports donations.
« Last Edit: October 20, 2013, 06:22:24 pm by DJ Omnimaga »

Offline SpiroH

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #6 on: October 21, 2013, 09:29:48 am »
I honestly haven't thought a lot about the subject but i was just wondering if a 'calc lottery (latest brand model's)' wouldn't be a possibility to further raise donations. Are there any special countraindications? :-\

Offline Adriweb

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #7 on: October 21, 2013, 09:47:52 am »
I believe it would be a good idea.... but for a larger community :/
I doubt enough people would be willing to participate enough to cover the costs of a Nspire CX CAS for example.

(or... well, maybe some will put like 20$ and some others 5$, thus giving way more chance to those giving more.... I know it's the principle of a lottery, but with more members it'd probably be more lotter-like in the random draw aspect in the end ^^)

Maybe it would be nice to try, though.
(Maybe too on TI-Planet, however French laws aren't very lenient on stuff like that ... :/)
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Offline Sorunome

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #8 on: October 21, 2013, 09:49:13 am »
maybe there could be a trans-forum lottery, so that it is the same one for omni, ti-planet and cemetech, sharing the wins evenly

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Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #9 on: October 21, 2013, 12:22:26 pm »
Yea it would only work for communities with like 500+ adult members logged in at a time on a consistent basis, else such lottery would actually lose us money

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #10 on: October 21, 2013, 12:27:27 pm »
Having a poll on the forum might help knowing if it would be viable, actually.

Consider 25 people donating 10$... it could be good enough for a CX CAS.
But yeah, now we'll need to be sure 25 people give $10....
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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #11 on: October 21, 2013, 01:21:48 pm »
That might be a good idea, making something Omnimaga and TI-Planet together, splitting the revenues together.

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #12 on: October 21, 2013, 01:33:02 pm »
Currently donation money is going towards supporting the contest. When the contest is done I will start drawing on it to recoup server costs ($24USD/month).
/e

Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #13 on: October 21, 2013, 06:15:17 pm »
Having a poll on the forum might help knowing if it would be viable, actually.

Consider 25 people donating 10$... it could be good enough for a CX CAS.
But yeah, now we'll need to be sure 25 people give $10....
I guess an alternate solution could be to display if the goal has been reached so far, then put a TOS/warning/disclaimer stating that if it hasn't been reached, a cheaper calc will be given instead or in the worst case scenario, an iTunes/whatever gift card.

Now if only it was possible to integrate bandcamp into websites further, it would have been cool to automatically offer download or discount codes to participants for my music. Of course they would not apply if Omni reaches 12500 posts in a single month, though, since my music price is completely dependent on Omni's monthly postcount (above 12500 it's free, 10000-12499 $1, 7500-9999 $2, 5000-7499 $3, 2500-4999 $4, 1000-2499 $5 and under 1000 $6)
« Last Edit: October 21, 2013, 06:18:40 pm by DJ Omnimaga »

Offline Streetwalrus

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Re: Transparency regarding donations
« Reply #14 on: October 22, 2013, 10:14:13 am »
On our (TI-Planet) sidebar, we have a list of recent donators (which I need to update - oops), but what we also do is that if the donator is a TI-Planet member, he becomes part of the "Premium" group (along with its tag/badge on each post), which on top of showing that the member supports us, has the feature of removing the ads on the website :)
There are ads on TI Planet ? :trollface:
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Edit : They're not disturbing anyway so I set an exception. ;)
« Last Edit: October 22, 2013, 10:15:36 am by Streetwalker »