5. If they went full commercial, all the bad words would be filtered out...huh??? guess they've never actually been here...
Posted on 04/19/2012 5:38:57 PM PDT by Jim Robinson
RimJob Cries Uncle!
Last edited Thu Apr 19, 2012, 04:44 PM USA/ET - Edit history (1)
For fifteen years, the Wizard of the cesspool FreeRepublic has been beyond adamant that his little sewer would never -never- adopt an advertising, pay, or membership model. Well, what have we here?
... the beginning of the end? One can but hope.
"Alternatives to donor based, ie, freepathon business model" April 19, 2012 | Jim Robinson
Posted on Thursday, April 19, 2012 16:22:35 by Jim Robinson
I've checked with an ad agency. We can probably raise the funds we need to operate FR at our current level and at the current market price for online advertising if we run a banner ad at the top of every page and at least one rectangular ad in the above the fold body of the page and a couple rectangular ads in the sidebar. If that doesn't generate enough revenue, we can also run pop ups or pop unders and we can even run audio and video ads if need be. But of course, if we go full bore commercial, we'd have to insure strict copyright compliance with very brief excerpting of all articles to avoid lawsuits. And the agency would require that we install a filter to censor out any bad or unacceptable words in our posts.
Or, of course, there's always the membership model. We could setup a members only system where paying members get full access and non-paying members get throttled back, etc.
I don't like either of the above models and think we'd soon lose a lot of our readers and participants. Of course that may happen anyway if we can't fund it and if we cannot get our equipment problem under control, or if my refusal to vote for or support an abortionist/homosexualist/statist who has plans to install ObamaCare, er, I mean RomneyCare into all 50 states runs everyone off.
The donation model has served us very well since 1997 when we first started using it. It's very clean, uncomplicated and we attract participants who perhaps can't afford membership dues but do want to join the discussion and join our rallies, protests, prayer sessions, etc. And the advertising model would probably bring in the revenue, but it comes with strings attached.
I'm sure there are other ways and ways to combine features of various models, sell books, cds, gear, etc, offer no ads for paid subscribers, etc, even ISP services, but all of these also complicate matters.
I'm an old dog and I like to avoid new tricks, new complications, additional overhead, additional accounting, additional rules and regulations, etc, wherever possible. I like to stick to simplicity and with what works.
Thank you all very much for your continuing participation and support.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2874129/posts
I try to keep in mind that there'll be no bag limit once it kicks off . . .
Church bingo was taken to court in Tennessee and found to be a lottery and lost.
That ruling was extended to charitable duckie races where yellow rubber duckies with a number on the bottom race down the river. The first to finish wins the prize. Duckie races were a lottery.
Later, a state lottery, the only permitted lottery, proceeds to the educator mafia, was established
People can vote how they want.
People can compromise their values and principles all they want to justify their vote.
Don’t ever expect Free Republic to compromise its principles too.
My very first desire is to keep FR up and running. Some change may be acceptable if the alternative is to shut FR down. I would like to point out that DU has advertising and it doesn’t appear to me that much censorship of words or themes is evident there.
Well, I’m no expert on “gaming”
“And the agency would require that we install a filter to censor out any bad or unacceptable words in our posts.”
Izat working on the zombie sites?
If ads can help in some way, without usurping total freedom here, we should give it a go.
My very first desire is to keep FR up and running. Some change may be acceptable if the alternative is to shut FR down. I would like to point out that DU has advertising and it doesn’t appear to me that much censorship of words or themes is evident there.
Gear, books and so forth are a good idea. Leverage the membership through a FreeRepublic Store.
Something else you might consider, would be maybe offering extra features for paying members such as more sophisticated reporting and search features, as an example.
Work out your own advertising scheme and sell it to business that accept FR as it is. I'm not sure why you need an agency.
What ever you need to do, just keep up the good work!
It is beyond time to get new infrastructure.
Do it and I will cancel my monthly donation!
Is your solution to stay home this fall?
Nope,can't say that I do.One of the advantages of being an old geezer I suspect.Can I assume that it's not something you'd call your mother?
5. If they went full commercial, all the bad words would be filtered out...huh??? guess they've never actually been here...
Jim: Go for the advertising. You should do very well with some good old conservative sponsors connecting up with the Freeper community. I think they will line up to be part of FR.
Just don’t take any Limbaugh cast-offs. LOL.
But you have made the right decisions for 15 years so I’m not going to argue with you if you stick to the current model.
DU hoodie
No.
If donations aren't doing enough, I for one would be fine with a paid monthly/annual membership model, and certainly that beats taking on advertising in any form.
If you consider memberships, I would suggest drop the registered-but-non-"member" privs back to a lower level, say for example, allow posting a max of 2 comments per day, no profile page, and no posting articles. Enough to wet the whistle but not a very significant load on the servers.
Registered "members" get to do everything that we registered folks do now, and get a listing on the "members" page (unless anonymity requested).
Plus maybe offer something like a bumper sticker or FR Pajama Patrol Deputy badge for those of us who would flaunt it. :)
Have to think about whether being a paid member grants any zot resistance. I think not immunity, but at the same time it seems like there might be something to balance there, like say suspension rather than annihilation. Hmmmmm...
Anyway Jim, do whatever you have to do to keep FreeRepublic online and independent. I can't live without it!!
What if we pay-pal’d to an account to buy FR merchandise, like T-shirts and hats and bumper stickers, and got 2,5 or 10 bingo cards depending on the amount?
I like the idea of FR merchandise as well. I’m sure we would all love to have some FReeper stuff, and it would provide great gifts to annoy the heck out of liberals.
A FR tee shirt or baseball cap is FRee advertising and a great conversation starter.
We can do lots of things, but I’m pretty confident that we’ll make it through this Marxist induced downturn in the economy eventually and all boats will rise with the tide including ours. We’re going to continue plunging ahead, tighten our belts, raise the funds, beg, borrow or steal (metaphorically speaking), install some new equipment, make improvements when and where we can and continue fighting the good fight, unencumbered and unbeholden to anyone but our like-minded loyal participants and supporters.
In other words, damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead!!
Thank you very much!!
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