SoylentNews

martyb writes:

Just three days ago, I asked for the community's help to raise funds for continuing operations. Incoming funds were trending upwards — but way too slowly — and it was clear we were going to come up short. I was genuinely worried about our ability to continue as a going concern.

My fears were, apparently, unwarranted... over those three days we received 49 subscriptions totaling approximately $1534.74 which led us to exceed our base goal of $3000.00 for the first half of the year!

THANK-YOU!!

Of these 49 subscriptions, the vast majority were for $20.00 (36 of these), but we also had 3@$40.00, 1@$50, and (drum roll please) 3@$200.00! And for those who subscribed at other amounts, I also thank you. I've had times in my life when my finances did not allow me to help others as I'd wished. Every bit helps!

Let me interrupt the funding-focus for a moment to call attention to a notable accomplishment among our staff: Our Editor in Chief, janrinok (aka JR), just passed 4,000 stories posted to the site! There was a long stretch about a year or so into SoylentNews' existence when JR and LaminatorX (aka LamX) handled pretty much *all* of the story duties on the site. During that period, story submissions were rare and often little more than a bare link to a story of interest. So they'd tag-team finding stories on the web, making submissions, posting stories, and reviewing same. Were it not for their extended and heroic efforts, there would have been a period of months with almost no stories for us to read. LamX left us a couple years ago (would love to have ya back!) But JR has stuck with us, and we are forever indebted to him for his generous contributions of time, expertise, and guidance. Please join me in congratulating JR for reaching this amazing milestone!

Many thanks, too, for the feedback in the comments to the earlier story — I read every one of them — but am in severe crunch mode at work and lacked the spare time to respond individually as I would have liked. I'll respond to a couple items here.

There was a suggestion to set up a "war chest" from which we could draw off interest to support continuing operations among other things. I don't anticipate we will have $100K in the bank any time soon (one of the suggestions), but having a rainy-day fund "just in case" does seem prudent to me. In light of that, you may have noticed in the "Site News" slashbox there are now two goals listed: a base goal and a stretch goal.

So how much should the stretch goal be for?

As it now stands, we have received approximately $125 in excess of our base goal. So, how about $2000.00? With only about 3 weeks remaining in the period, that seemed like too much of a stretch. I pulled a number out of my butt and came up with $1000.00 which is still a stretch (doh!), but I believe is attainable. I am mindful that we have the second half of the year ahead of us and will be needing funds for that period, too. So, I am NOT asking for folks to go crazy to reach this stretch goal at the expense (pun intended!) of the needs for the rest of the year... if you can help out, that's great! If not, well that's okay, too.

Another suggestion was a means to generate funds besides subscriptions. I failed to mention this in my earlier exhortation, but we DO have SoylentNews-related things for sale over at https://www.zazzle.com/soylentnews*. (NOTE: The asterisk at the end of the link is intentional and gives SoylentNews a slightly larger return on each purchase; please leave it in.) This link is also listed in the Site News slashbox ("buy SoylentNews Swag"), should you wish to refer back to it.

We are still in the process of taking advantage of the free disk space upgrade available from Linode. It is unclear at the moment whether these free disk upgrades will make further server consolidation possible, but we are looking into it. We will keep you informed as we proceed with the upgrades, as well.

One more thing. One of the comments mentioned how soylentnews.org had become their "goto site" to see if the internet was up. I nearly fell out of my chair! Those who were with us the first few weeks of the site will well recall how we would have multiple crashes each day. That things have changed so dramatically as this... please join me in thanking the sysops who may stay out of the limelight, but keep things running like a top!

Again, please accept my thanks for the huge outpouring of support for the site. I am humbled by the generosity of the community and count it a distinct honor to be able to play some role in it. --martyb

Original Submission