What would you do if the forum had a subscription fee (to post classifieds, etc)?

problem is he'd give everything away to the poor people.

Are you sure ?

I think he would give the poor people nothing, like he has always done.

No he would not. God (all praise to him) has consistently decreed the death of poor people far earlier than those who have a bit of cash to spare.

God can run the Mosque thread, but what the hell does he know about bikes? Don't give me that omniscience stuff, he'd still have edscoble out-snob him on choice bike parts.

Christ on a bike, I'll out-snob him on bike parts anyday.

Are you sure ?

I think he would give the poor people nothing, like he has always done.

your probably right

your probably right

I think the whole "god is nice to all the little children and the poor and watches over you as you sleep to make sure you are safe" version of god is fairly recent, maybe Victorian or pre-Victorian, but if you read the two salient books in their entirety (rather than a selection of passages that meet our modern liberal views) the Judeo-Christian deity is a proper fucking monster. Yahweh is an accomplished cunt. Slavery, murder, genocide, patricide, peadocide (have I made up a word ?) fratricide, blood sacrifice, rape . . . all approved - and even demanded by - the Christian god.

It seems around the time of the Victorians they got him mixed up with Santa Claus.

Oh god, look what you have done, there I go again with my distaste for superstition, I should really stop.

Back on topic . . . .

£3 = Good idea, a kind of encouraged donation.

Good compromise.

Do we get a special "I donated" badge under our icon, I want people to know I have been putting it about.

@ VB: Did you get my biblically themed PAYPAL donation a few weeks back ?

Do we get a special "I donated" badge under our icon, I want people to know I have been putting it about.

good idea

I think the whole "god is nice to all the little children and the poor and watches over you as you sleep to make sure you are safe" version of god is fairly recent, maybe Victorian or pre-Victorian, but if you read the two salient books in their entirety (rather than a selection of passages that meet our modern liberal views) the Judeo-Christian deity is a proper fucking monster. Yahweh is an accomplished cunt. Slavery, murder, genocide, patricide, peadocide (have I made up a word ?) fratricide, blood sacrifice, rape . . . all approved - and even demanded by - the Christian god.

It seems around the time of the Victorians they got him mixed up with Santa Claus.

Oh god, look what you have done, there I go again with my distaste for superstition, I should really stop.

again your probably right :)

As a newbie and foreigner who has not come to the forums for fixed info (I am old and know it all) or parts (you lot don't have parts for my bitchin bike) but because my sister lives near Downham polo and I am coming to visit for a week and thought it would be fun to see a game (and I know that is a run on sentence its been along day).

The point is after a week I would gladly pay for the outrageous entertainment and London nostalgia (I commuted from Fulham Rd. to Old St. for 4 years on a bike 30 years ago and had the roads mostly to myself except for an occasional car) that this forum provides.

It would be nice if the tee shirt comp and other fund raisers worked, as I am sure they do but at the expense of a volunteers time and years into it that may get old. So why not charge something to make it tick over with out the hassle and the other can be done as charity or special fund raisers.

It was touched on to charge more to Euro and US and I think that is a fine idea... I might even take it a step further - I pound for greater Londoners, then 1 pound increases every 100 miles from London. I mean it is LONDON fgss!

i'd be happy to pay £3 a year; think its a great idea if its just a one off annual compulsory donation

I'll happily pay a tenner a year, more if you want.

What he said.

If nothing else this thread has been a bit on an eye opener as to the costs (not forgetting the most precious commodity - time) that goes into running a site like this.

Therefore a donation has been, err, donated.

I highly doubt that VB would make a profit out of the £3 asked, I agree with many previous posters that it is a resource that far outweighs the asking price. I do not like the idea that VB for all his efforts has to shell out every month to keep this up and running for us.
I for one, like many I suspect have found the forum to provide me with much more than a group of people to chat bike to. Thanks to the forum I have expanded my social network, improved my fitness, had a trusted resource at my fingertips for all my needs, and learned a wee bit ;)
Three quid a year? Totally.

What would you do if the forum had a subscription fee?

Pay it happily.

Definitely worth the price of a couple of beers.

£3 for forum / 365 days = 0.8p

£6 for forum / 365 days = 1.6p

Just a little more than a penny a day? I think that's doable.

What would you do if the forum had a subscription fee?

I probably wouldn't want to pay because internet = free innit.

However, I think you are marketing this all wrong. As you know, the proposed subscription fee isn't just to use the forum, it is to sell things in the classified sections. What you should have said is:

Would you pay to post classified ads in the classified section?

And of course the answer is obvious. No change in demographic, no elitism, it doesn't put off new users, there is simply a fee charged in order to post classified adverts; which I think is pretty reasonable.

The more tricky part is how you break down that charge.

An annual subscription to post as many classified threads as you like? £3-£5 a year since that is what you've already hit on.

A fee per thread? You could easily set up a credits system, with a credit docked for each new thread in the classified section. A 25p fee per thread might be reasonable here.

Of course people will say that someone selling a £800 bike shouldn't pay the same as someone selling an £8 seatpost, but then it becomes a nightmare to manage and you might as well have invented eBay. Then others will claim that posting more than one item in a thread is unfair for the same fee, blah blah blah. I don't care.

I think the idea is reasonable, but I think you need to move your focus away from "a fee to use the forum" to "charging for classified ads".

that's a good call.
but I would keep it simple with an annual subscription fee too access the classified forum...

internet = free innit.

A very common misperception.

The whole point of the poll is that the Internet is not free and that this stuff costs money.

A very common misperception.

The whole point of the poll is that the Internet is not free and that this stuff costs money.

Yes, but what about the rest of his post?

I think it's a good idea.

i can do your washing up for a month vb

I'd be more than happy to pay £3 a year. If VB can make a bit of cash on top, then good for him. The forum wouldn't exist without him. And the amount of time and effort that goes into keeping everything running smoothly deserves our support.

i say the forum provides us with shit loads of things to do socials rides events freebies
all members should have to pay a subscription hopefully not too much but a small contribution should be within everybodies grasp
anything left over at the end of the year can be used to buy dave beer

or as dave has good cotacts at microsoft can't we just ask bill for a billion ?

I'd quite happily pay £10+ a year. This board has become infested with whoppers over the last few weeks/months and the majority of the threads lately are embarrassing

Cloud thread anyone? Knife appreciation thread?!?! Fucking Chip pan chat!?!

I've voted yes but, in retrospect, I probably wouldn't pay a subscription fee. The benefits offered are of little interest to me. I don't keep PMs, I can't imagine creating any groups and I don't sell stuff (I've made two entries in the classified section. One was to let people know of a bargain that I didn't profit from and one attempt to sell something small that dropped like a stone and I don't care if I lose that priviledge). On the other hand I will keep donating my £10 or so a year and will buy forum merchandise and so on.

VB, if you don't like going cap in hand, have you thought of getting someone to volunteer as a fundraiser.

On the otherhand, scrap that idea, that'll just turn into tynan walking around with a big stick and a mooching sack.

I'd quite happily pay £10+ a year. This board has become infested with whoppers over the last few weeks/months and the majority of the threads lately are embarrassing

Cloud thread anyone? Knife appreciation thread?!?! Fucking Chip pan chat!?!

80's football? famous scousers? !!!! :-)