I was a regular poster on Lucianne.com for ten years. Perhaps I can give some perspective on their model. They have a combination ad revenue/donation setup. The ads present little problem except for three minor issues:
1) The ads seem at times to be chosen/computer-generated based upon certain key words in the article posted. Therefore, an article about how Mitt Romney supported the homosexual agenda in Massachusetts might be accompanied by an ad promoting gay cruises in the Caribbean. To some extent they were able to limit those anomalies, but not entirely.
2) On rare occasion, the site went down. On at least one occasion, I think that the site failure was tied to a rogue script in one of the ads. That was a rare event, however.
3) Some users, especially those on dialup, will probably have a much slower computer experience because of the ads.
Otherwise, the ads seemed relatively innocuous.
In the distant past, Lucianne.com sold LDot merchandise through a third party, but I don’t think that it was a major success.
With regard to the $2 processing fee: facepalm!! I’ll try to keep that in mind in the future.
I think that making FreeRepublic a members only site would be a mistake. It would lessen its influence in the country at large. Having special perks for members might work, however.
I can appreciate the financial difficulty in trying to keep a site like this up and running. As a long-time social conservative, I have noticed the trend in which the conservative wing of the Party is supported by many people of limited means who are only able to give small donations; but they are overwhelmed by the liberal wing of the Party, whose fewer but wealthier contributors are able to give more. I would imagine that you have lost quite a few contributors in recent weeks. Nevertheless, I appreciate your conservative voice and your effort to continue to give those of us on the right a prominent voice as well. Thanks.
Thanks, but I don’t know what the $2.00 processing fee is referring to? That sounds like a misunderstanding somewhere to me. It might amount to a $2.00 - $3.00 fee on a hundred dollar donation, but otherwise credit card processing fees are a relatively small percentage, usually in the neighborhood of three percent or so. Maybe a little higher on smaller donations through paypal, because I think they have a fixed fee per transaction element as part of their rate which might drive it up to 4% or more on a small donation. And we have an estimate for the credit card and bank processing fees factored into our budget anyway.
I would like to avoid advertising if at at possible due to its many drawbacks. I’d also like to avoid going commercial at all if possible. I think it would change the nature of our grassroots conservative activist organization.