posted by
NCommander
on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:01PM
from the help-us-become-financially-independent dept.
from the help-us-become-financially-independent dept.
It's been a long, hard road to this point, but I'm pleased to announce that effective immediately, we are officially accepting subscriptions to SoylentNews. Subscription support is an important step in helping make SoylentNews successful as an independent entity that is fully funded by its users. In case you don't remember, here's the rundown of subscription features:
- Subscriber badge (toggleable)
- Early access to features
- Exemption from ads if we ever run any
- Full comment histories/access to database-intensive operations
- No rate limiting or spam filtering
You can purchase a subscription on your user panel, or by clicking this link. Subscriptions are $20/year, and you can be reminded via email when that period is coming to an end via subscription settings. All payments are currently processed by PayPal, but we hope to add new merchant support in the future.
Here's hoping to seeing lots of stars in the near future!
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(Score: 2) by prospectacle on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:10PM
Great work setting this up. Hopefully enough money will be raised to buy you a company jet, or at least keep the site running without staff having to dip into their own pockets.
Could we see some stats after a few days, of how many people have signed up?
Anyway, the steady rate progress on this site is greatly appreciated and also my mug is pretty cool.
If a plan isn't flexible it isn't realistic
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:43PM
> Could we see some stats after a few days, of how many people have signed up?
I would like to see a sort of "funding meter" that shows the status of incoming money (subs, swag sales and anything else) versus expenses (including salaries).
Put it right on the front page, maybe in a default slashbox. That way everyone in the community is aware of the financial health and if there is a short-fall you don't have to beg because we'll all know it.
(Score: 1) by cngn on Thursday August 28 2014, @09:05PM
I agree, not from a "lemme look at how much you are spending" point of view, more towards getting an idea of how financially healthy we are.
Plus if there's a shortfall or a big expense coming up, I will give more in a way of a one-off donation, not too sure but I hope that are other people like me here, who are ready to help.
Or can I quote "Rodney Carrington"......"Show them to me". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh2PjkzW20w [youtube.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @09:57PM
omg i'm jealous of your star... no seriously i am
(Score: 2, Funny) by cngn on Thursday August 28 2014, @10:55PM
What star?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @11:01PM
Yeah, I'm not too interested in the expense breakdown. Just the general health.
(Score: 2) by Tramii on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:17PM
Maybe I've missed it, but I don't see any pricing information. I've clicked on the subscription link (http://soylentnews.org/subscribe.pl) and it doesn't tell me how much it costs or if it's a one time charge or recurring. After clicking on the Paypal link, I see that it wants to charge me $20, but again I don't know if that's for 1 month or 6 months or forever.
I think the subscription page should include this information so that it's clear to the user.
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:19PM
Price is an epic $20/year. We should probably clarify that in the article.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:59PM
Price is an epic $20/year. We should probably clarify that in the article.
And on the subscriptions TAB itself, since this article will scroll out of site soon.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:11PM
Patch for that is already in. Should be up on the live subscriptions page before too long.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:21PM
I've added that info to this article. Thanks for the heads up.
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @09:59PM
once you subscribe it takes out $20 for every -1 modded comment (j/k)
(Score: 2) by Tork on Friday August 29 2014, @03:17AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Kell on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:21PM
I believe in this site and its mission to serve the community. I'll put my money where my mouth is. The green site never got a dollar from me.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 3, Funny) by nitehawk214 on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:33PM
The receipted listed "365-Page Subscription to SoylentNews". I assume this should read 365-Day.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:39PM
This is true. We'll get that fixed ASAP. Thanks = )
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 5, Funny) by tibman on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:43PM
Keeping with trends, SN decided to go with a page reading cap. Please keep your reading to an average of one page per day. If you go over this limit then your reading threshhold is set to -1 and posts rated over 1 will not be visible : )
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 4, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:15PM
We were going to but NCommander kept complaining of digital paper cuts from counting them. I'm still confused about this.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by mmcmonster on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:22PM
What type of page?
At 4K per page, I'm not sure how much that buys me.
Or maybe the site's going to be viewable only on PDF readers. But are they standard 8.5x11 pages? And what sort of margin?
(But seriously, going to give you guys a year of support. Hope that the backend is still getting updates.)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by strattitarius on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:33PM
Full comment histories/access to database-intensive operations
Are you giving people read-only access to the logs? A data warehouse? What if I don't want anyone with $20 to look at my "life" history on SN? That's part of why I dropped social media. What if I am a Brit and want to be forgotten?
These are some of my concerns with that "feature".
Slashdot Beta Sucks. Soylent Alpha Rules. News at 11.
(Score: 3, Funny) by buswolley on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:43PM
Its already available via google.
subicular junctures
(Score: 3, Informative) by edIII on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:14PM
Why is this moderated funny?
Everyone's got their panties in a bunch about being able to scrape a user's comments "with only 20$ in their pockets" like the information would be private otherwise :)
Just search Google with this:
Should be modded informative. What can you get with a subscription that I just didn't hand to you on a plate?
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 4, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:03PM
Absolutely not. We're just going to be allowing them to do things that hammer our database harder than we'd normally allow. I can't give you an example off the top of my head except for full comments history and lack of posting delays as I'm fairly certain we've not implemented any others. Yet.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by goodie on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:16PM
ok so to be clear we are not talking direct DB access for querying purposes like was mentioned at some point in the past few weeks/months? Just to be clear, because I would have been interested in that to draw some trends on SN data :)
I am guessing then that will be implemented in the form of "restricted" features accessible through the site itself.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:30PM
Right, website features. I think what was previously discussed was hosting your own db on our servers as part of a subscription but that's not in planning at the moment that I know of. We can't exactly go giving out database access to our production db with a list of every user's email address in it; that's just not going to happen unless we all wake up evil one morning.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Funny) by edIII on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:16PM
Well.. then let's hope you guys don't run out of coffee.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by strattitarius on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:43PM
Slashdot Beta Sucks. Soylent Alpha Rules. News at 11.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 28 2014, @06:06PM
As well you should. Anyone with access to the production DB has more access than almost all of the staff. Good to see other mods fixing a bad one.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:24PM
It's a great question. I think it's a moot point though. If we really want to be private like that then we have to stop letting Google index the pages.
I posted it in a reply to another comment, but advanced search with Google combined with a little bit of regex and curl can get me a list of all your comments with metadata.
strattitarius (3191) site: soylentnews.org
I immediately tried it, and I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about it. Then again, I trust SoylentNews.org to not allow email addresses, real names, and other user metadata from being associated with my user id that I don't let be public already.
There are forums that are not publicly searchable unless you log-in, and that allows you to mitigate such scraping attempts. Don't think that's the right path for SoylentNews myself.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by strattitarius on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:36PM
I am more worried about emails addresses and ip addresses. And probably other things I can't even think of right now.
Slashdot Beta Sucks. Soylent Alpha Rules. News at 11.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by zafiro17 on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:41PM
I totally support this site, its community, and its mission. Happy to put my money where my mouth is. Guess now we'll know how it all shakes out, eh? Is this the beginning of a two-echelon class system? Kidding.
Oh wow, here's the members' only bathroom with Chanel#5 in the toilet - sweet! Why, yes, I would like a glass of champagne, thank you. Be a dear and park my Mercedes around the side, will you? So tell me, Jeeves, what do the plebes do with their time, mmmm?
Wow, even the articles look better with a little yellow star next to them!
Lifting my glass of champagne to the folks who have put in blood, sweat, and tears to make this site run - that's the people coding, writing, editing, commenting, and promoting this little pocket of green awesomeness (green with the BadA55 theme FTW). This wasn't easy, but it was worth it. Long live SoylentNews!
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis - Jack Handey
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Thursday August 28 2014, @08:43PM
Zaf - that was nicely done with a touch of humour. But not all of the posts in this thread have been in quite the same vein. Members realise, of course, that running any site must have a cost associated with it and many have asked about contributing to help out with covering these costs. It was discovered that accepting donations was not as straight-forward as one might at first think - there were all sorts of legal hoops that had to be jumped through just to enable SN to accept donations. But offering subscriptions appears to be the least contentious way of enabling members to help support the site.
No-one is being coerced into subscribing - and there is no limit to what the site offers to non-subscribers compared with what we have been offering for the last 6 months or so. But, for those that wish to do so, they can now subscribe - and to ensure that it is not a donation we offer the potential to be able to access some of the stories and comment data more directly in the future. The site only exists because of the community. Everyone contributes to its success - by submissions, comments, coding, buying swag, or simply by page visits.
None of the 'staff' take a salary as was mentioned in one post, nobody takes anything out of the system other than essential running expenses and we all do what we do because we, like every other member of this community, believe in what we are trying to achieve.
Anyway, I discovered that the VIP toilet key is not much use in France - it only gives me access to the same roadside bush that everyone else seems to urinate against! However, my dream is that one day, whilst urinating against the aforementioned bush, I will realise that the person standing next to me is also wearing a SN t-shirt, with his Mercedes key dangling from his unobtainium key ring....
(Score: 2) by Snow on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:45PM
Right now paypal is the only option? Have you considered Bitcoin? It's easy to accept, just sign up with coinbase or something and you can get your money converted and sent to you daily. Low fees too.
Bitcoin is seriously great to use over the internet. Especially for things like this where you do not require my home address.
Please seriously consider it.
-- Snow
(Score: 2) by tibman on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:50PM
Someone who is collecting bitcoins could be the middle-man. You send them 20$ worth of BC and they gift you a sub.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Snow on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:52PM
Okay, I'm fine with that. Anyone want to buy me a sub in exchange for $20USD in bitcoin? I'll cover your paypall fees too.
(Score: 1) by Horse With Stripes on Friday August 29 2014, @11:57AM
I'll send a subscription your way for $20 in 'Itchy & Scratchy Dollars', a box of Space Food Sticks (preferably unopened) or an old Spirograph game if the green pen still works.
(Score: 2) by Snow on Friday August 29 2014, @05:16PM
Ahh! I got my shiny star! You are a gentleman and a scholar, and I can only assume you must be damn good looking as well.
I don't know how to PM you, or if that is even possible, but please send me your bitcoin address, and I'll make good.
-- Snow
(Score: 1) by Horse With Stripes on Friday August 29 2014, @05:20PM
Snow,
I don't actually use bitcoins (hell, I don't even like real coins). Just make a $20 to a local animal charity and we'll call it even.
HWS
(Score: 2) by Snow on Friday August 29 2014, @07:14PM
Well thank you very much!
I have donated $40 CAD to the Vancouver SPCA:
https://bitpay.com/invoice?utf8=%E2%9C%93&id=RgyhiUJen7fzyhTDTPGBbS [bitpay.com]
(Score: 1) by Horse With Stripes on Friday August 29 2014, @09:51PM
You sir, are a gentleman and a scholar. Pleasure doing business with you. :-)
(Score: 3, Informative) by mrcoolbp on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:53PM
We already are. FTFS:
We are trying to make sure there are no legal hangups first.
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 2) by Snow on Thursday August 28 2014, @04:54PM
Awesome! I'll standby then.
You guys are doing great work. Keep it up!
(Score: 2) by Kilo110 on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:13PM
Can you post another update when bitcoin is added?
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:17PM
Of course.
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 3, Informative) by edIII on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:29PM
The very second that you do add other merchants I'll get a subscription.
Paypal is a criminal banking organization that uses strong arm tactics and legal fuckery to steal people's money. May their genitals be itchy and burning :)
But, yeah, Paypal is not for everyone. Hope anyone that does have an account is donating.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Thursday August 28 2014, @11:28PM
I like to pay for goods and services with live poultry. That way, the CIA and Google can't track me. Do you plan to support this payment option in the near future?
(Score: 2) by mrcoolbp on Monday September 01 2014, @03:28AM
Sure.
(Score:1^½, Radical)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DECbot on Thursday August 28 2014, @11:30PM
Any change that you'll support Google Wallet (1)? Honestly, I want to support SN, but object to Paypal's terms of service--or at least how they execute their service.
(1) yeah, i know it's google, but I already have an account b/c of Android/Gmail/G+/sites/Chrome/search..... It's like the NSA, at this point, why bother trying to hide it?
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday August 29 2014, @02:57AM
I don't know if it's been discussed but it can't be any worse to code for than paypal, so I've no objection. It wouldn't hurt to stick it up as a feature request on the issue tracker [github.com].
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by cosurgi on Thursday August 28 2014, @06:49PM
We are looking around now: https://litecointalk.org/index.php?topic=21796.0 [litecointalk.org]
#
#\ @ ? [adom.de] Colonize Mars [kozicki.pl]
#
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Friday August 29 2014, @08:16AM
I run a site that accepts cryptocurrencies for donations, so I could probably help with adding the functionality, IF you want to host the wallets yourselves. At the very least I can point you to the right documentation and donate my code, so you can save a couple of hours on that.
In capitalist America, ads view YOU!
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday August 29 2014, @11:39AM
Appreciate the offer but we're going with GoPay so we never have to actually own any cryptocurrencies or deal with the accounting necessary for doing so. There is, however, no perl module to interface with their API, so I'm having to write one from scratch before we can even get down to the logic side of things. My personal goal is to have it ready to roll out by the first weekend of September but you lot know how good time estimates are when they're made before you even start on a project.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 29 2014, @12:44PM
Given that you didn't say September of which year, I'm pretty sure you'll be able to deliver in time. ;-)
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Friday August 29 2014, @12:51PM
Ok, I'd expect it'd be esier for you to have a third party to handle it. Have fun with the coding!
In capitalist America, ads view YOU!
(Score: 1) by iWantToKeepAnon on Wednesday September 10 2014, @10:10PM
"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." -- Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
(Score: 2) by egcagrac0 on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:13PM
Say it ain't so...
I can see a troll electing to invest $20 for the lulz.
Hopefully, any trouble can quickly be quashed without having to go back to the board and ask for permission to void a subscription.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by paulej72 on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:49PM
Team Leader for SN Development
(Score: 4, Funny) by black6host on Thursday August 28 2014, @06:10PM
Woo hoo! Just spent my 20 bucks.
Now, let me tell you about this product I have that you probably need. That's right, you probably need this. It can change your life.
What does my product do? Well, it is 100% guaranteed to remove all the hair from your head! Having problems with going bald? Don't suffer through that process. Get it over with! Leave contact details in a comment and I'll make sure to hook you up! Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back!
Yep, it works! No spam filter :)
(Score: 3, Funny) by egcagrac0 on Thursday August 28 2014, @06:35PM
Hundreds of stay at home moms are losing all their hair on the internet with this one weird old trick...
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Thursday August 28 2014, @08:54PM
Mother Nature and genetics did that already, you insensitive clod!
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 2) by black6host on Friday August 29 2014, @02:13AM
Man, I am soooo sorry. Is there a part of your anatomy that is too short? I'll not bring up my next offer if that's the case :)
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Friday August 29 2014, @11:47AM
Nope, no issues there, but if you encroach on my secret for making it bigger... we are gonna have a duel. And it won't be a sword fight!
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 2) by Dale on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:27PM
Subscription added. I hope overall it generates enough to cover costs with a bit left over for some new projects to add to the site.
(Score: 1) by barrahome on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:55PM
Done!!! Great now we can help you all! keep the good work!
(Score: 2) by metamonkey on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:59PM
SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!!
Okay 3, 2, 1, let's jam.
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Thursday August 28 2014, @06:25PM
And thanks to all of the staff and volunteers that have worked to make this such a great place to hang out.
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 2, Insightful) by yours truly on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:19PM
I'd be glad to support the site but don't do paypal. I do have a credit card and even a bank account stateside from which I could send an old-fashioned check. Keep us posted on alternate payment possibilities
(Score: 2) by everdred on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:20PM
I had been looking at the mugs in the swag store, but I'm not sure I like the logo design with the ".org" at the end.
This, on the other hand, was a no-brainer.
(Score: 2) by black6host on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:39PM
When this came up earlier a number of approaches were floated as possibilities. I had made a comment suggesting that a reasonable annual subscription without a lot of fluff would be the only one I could consider.
I'm sure others mentioned the same and I'm glad we were heard. Now I've put my money where my mouth was......
Thanks to all who keep this running. And I'm more than happy to contribute to help keep it going.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @09:55PM
Barrabas is probably rolling in his grave after seeing this announcement.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by krishnoid on Thursday August 28 2014, @11:06PM
Are you considering a lifetime membership (knowing that the site could become lame, be acquired, go away at any time)? If it's something reasonable, some people might prefer to pay once and not have to worry about an additional recurring bill.
(Score: 2) by Appalbarry on Friday August 29 2014, @04:26AM
Count me among those who really, really, really despise PayPal.
Surely there are better options for CC processing? Like maybe one of the (very few) companies that didn't bail on Wikileaks?
(Score: 2) by hellcat on Friday August 29 2014, @08:47AM
Agreed.
Also, you should consider having a corporate level join for more money.
Keep up the great work.
(Score: 2) by Jaruzel on Friday August 29 2014, @10:47AM
I said I would, and now I have. £12.43 GBP is peanuts.
I welcome my new subscription based overlords.
-Jar
This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
(Score: 2) by quadrox on Friday August 29 2014, @12:46PM
I hope this works, and a big thank you to all volunteers!
(Score: 2) by CoolHand on Wednesday October 01 2014, @01:53PM
Over 15 years at that other site, and they never once directly got money from me... 6 months here, and you get $20.. You guys must be good! :)
Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job-Douglas Adams