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So, in the background, the owners of the PBC have been working with staff to get the site moved over to a new legal entity and continue operations. This process is moving slowly, but it is moving, with the expectation that we should be able to fully hand off SN in the next month or so. However, the PBC has burned through its cash reserves, and we have an overdue Linode bill as is for $268 USD. I could write more, but the tl;dr, without money, SN will disappear off the Internet.
Most of the subscriptions understandably stopped due to the uncertainty with site ownership and management. However, we're not able to pay the bills with the trickle coming in. At this point, everyone involved has agreed with and are working towards a solution to move SN to a not-for-profit and 501(c)3, but we do need the communities financial support to get there. If we can raise $500 USD via subscriptions, direct donations, or other means, that would keep the site up past May. As such, if you have let your subscription lapse, or otherwise are able to support SN, please do so now.
Any funds raises will be donated to the *new* NFP as soon as it is able to accept funds. We'll run an update if/when we reach our funding goal.
- NCommander
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Wednesday March 06 2024, @06:19AM (1 child)
Several people complained that their attempts to subscribe where either being rejected (I don't know why) or, when successful, we were not being told that the subscriptions had been received. Without the information coming in the template is meaningless. It did not reflect the actual state of our finances, nor were people being credited with having subscribed. As far as we could see the account was not being credited with their subscriptions - but we had no idea where that money was going.
I, and many other people, get a daily statistics report showing the number of subscription made in the reporting period. It did not reflect the subscriptions that our members were making (and for which they provided proof that the payment had been accepted).
Expecting people to continue to contribute when the money they were giving could not be traced, nor was being reflected as had happened for the previous 9 years, seemed a risky thing to do.
I have commented elsewhere that the community must be able to see where their donations are going.
The site is NOT functioning as it did for 9 years or so. "We'll run an update if/when we reach our funding goal." is not how it should be working. What is the funding goal, what subscriptions have been received so far? I don't know where the breakdown has occurred and I am not apportioning blame to anyone. But our accounts are not as transparent as they have been in the past. This causes me great concern.
I have reached out to our accountant by email several times. Those emails have gone unanswered. I know that the current board is as keen to hand over the site as we are to receive it, but at the moment there is no visibility of our accounts that I am aware of. That might be that I am not looking in the right places. I was hoping that our accountant could tell me where I should be looking.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 06 2024, @08:18AM
I, too, am having great concern. Remember when SN was going to be the next Apple, or Fakebook? Ah, the good old days.