I'm dedicated to keeping diyAudio in good health as well as free and open for everyone.
It's doesn't come cheap - a great server host, 24x7 uptime support, quality high-performance server-grade hardware, bandwidth, the latest software packages, designers, developers. Right now we're in the middle of upgrading our server hardware again which should make a significant difference to page load times and latency.
To help cover costs, we're soon going to be offering extremely affordable paid membership levels offering a variety of added benefits to those who are generous enough to help us out financially. Your own custom forum user title, control over whether you want to see any advertising on the forum, an entry in our donors page, extra upload space for album images and limited editions of our soon-to-be-released t-shirts are all things being considered.
I'd like any focus to be on providing new additional functionality, features and benefits rather than taking anything away. If you have any suggestions for new features you'd like us to develop that you think would appeal to members or entice you to make a donation, please post them here or PM me.
Thanks,
Jason.
It's doesn't come cheap - a great server host, 24x7 uptime support, quality high-performance server-grade hardware, bandwidth, the latest software packages, designers, developers. Right now we're in the middle of upgrading our server hardware again which should make a significant difference to page load times and latency.
To help cover costs, we're soon going to be offering extremely affordable paid membership levels offering a variety of added benefits to those who are generous enough to help us out financially. Your own custom forum user title, control over whether you want to see any advertising on the forum, an entry in our donors page, extra upload space for album images and limited editions of our soon-to-be-released t-shirts are all things being considered.
I'd like any focus to be on providing new additional functionality, features and benefits rather than taking anything away. If you have any suggestions for new features you'd like us to develop that you think would appeal to members or entice you to make a donation, please post them here or PM me.
Thanks,
Jason.
From $10, for one year of benefits. Which happens to be less than the large frappachino I didn't have at Starbucks in Moscow last year
Sold!
What's the PP addy?
We'll have a neat little system up and running soon to take care of the administration of everything.
Pulled from the last thread on this topic..
I take it that this would be a desired improvement to the current print page system? Everything on the one page, graphics included, perhaps a choice of font size text wrapping/columns?
Ads, what ads?
Seriously, this place has some of the least-obtrusive advertising of any of the forums I'm on. Not that I'm complaining one bit
Yes, the current ads are practically not even there
Which provides quite poor incentive for sponsors to actually give us any money, so they haven't been giving us much money at all. We're going to have more ad spots in the future while striving to maintain the existing non-commercial feel, even for non-members. Of course, anyone who has contributed financially to the website gets to view the website however they want to view the website.Hi Jason,
I'd like to see 1) An exact quote search function that only looks at text (including spaces) not word recognition, and 2) the ability to search the results of a search.
I often go looking for a post I first saw when I didn't need the info but now I do. It is usually the case that I can remember a word that was used in the text but not how it was used - For example: I'm sure there was something about electrical & technology but that's all, it could have been "electronics technology" , "technical electronics", "an electrical technicality" etc. . . . To be able to search "electr" and then do a search of those results for "techn" would be great.
These functions are also highly useful when doing fresh searches where we know generally the sort of info we want to find but have no clear idea what form it may be in.
Thanks !
Hearinspace
Ads, what ads?
Seriously, this place has some of the least-obtrusive advertising of any of the forums I'm on. Not that I'm complaining one bit
I agree,I hardly ever notice the ads,and they're all audio-related anyways.It's not like we're being assaulted by weenie-pill pop-ups.
From $10, for one year of benefits. Which happens to be less than the large frappachino I didn't have at Starbucks in Moscow last year
Very fair and thanks for a great site ..................
Thanks for the suggestion. Search is a core website function, so if we make any improvements to that it will be for everyone to enjoy. Speaking of general website improvements, I'm going to shortly add a "request improvements" thing to the site so people can vote on suggestions..
What ads?
I have never seen what I would call an advertisement.
I do not count links to sponsors websites as an ad tho.
If we have paid membership are you still going to be running Beg-a-thons??
If we get ads can we expect discounts at the sites involved??
If we need to have paid memberships for full access can we add some really good calculators and such as part of the site? e:g Mathcad work sheets for using MJK's TL calculators, for this I would be willing to pay on a usage basis martins work is valuable and I agree with his stance on this.
All in all I could go to $25- US a year without harming my relations with SWMBO but as we are both members I would expect a household fee, not an individual cost.
Regards
Ted
I have never seen what I would call an advertisement.
I do not count links to sponsors websites as an ad tho.
If we have paid membership are you still going to be running Beg-a-thons??
If we get ads can we expect discounts at the sites involved??
If we need to have paid memberships for full access can we add some really good calculators and such as part of the site? e:g Mathcad work sheets for using MJK's TL calculators, for this I would be willing to pay on a usage basis martins work is valuable and I agree with his stance on this.
All in all I could go to $25- US a year without harming my relations with SWMBO but as we are both members I would expect a household fee, not an individual cost.
Regards
Ted
My preference is certainly to have relevant ads, all the time. I really don't want to see ads for ED popping up
I'd like to see membership drives replacing begathons.
That's up to the people showing the ads, but as it would mean more clickthroughs and goodwill for all I think they'd be silly not to. We'll be working with sponsors to get discounts for diyAudio members.
If anyone is willing to donate intellectual property for this purpose or have us develop web based technology based on their work, I am more than happy to hear from them (PM!). My general feeling towards this is that there should be no exclusivity on this website. Paid membership will not provide a key to any new or exclusive information, just nice frills.
If someone would like to offer diyAudio members a discount on their products or services, that would be wonderful and I would be happy to promote them in due context. I'm sure this would have positive benefits for them, the members, and the site.
I'm more than happy to cater for any special or unusual arrangements, including providing discounts to members from developing countries or who are financially restricted but have their hearts in the right place, on a case by case basis. Just write me
In a perfect world, I'd make the membership levels based on a multiple of the average price of a cup of coffee in your city, but I fear that would be far too difficult to implement.
Greets Jason
i did not expect
1/ such a prompt response
2/ such a detailed response
The comment about family membership was partially a joke, Cecile really only registered so she could post a rejoinder to a comment I made on a build thread.
I do expect you to make a good deal of money thru the T-shirt sales, I want a couple for me and I'll have to get a couple of XXXXL for SWMBO so please make sure we have at least one style for big girls and boys, heck Mambo T-shirts sell for $55- each Get Reg Mombasa to do the artwork and I'll pay that at least once.
Coffee here in Geelong averages $3.50 a cup for expresso, so a cup a month equals AUD$42- I'd not want to go higher tho.
Regards
And please keep up the good work; I have learnt so much hear here hear
i did not expect
1/ such a prompt response
2/ such a detailed response
The comment about family membership was partially a joke, Cecile really only registered so she could post a rejoinder to a comment I made on a build thread.
I do expect you to make a good deal of money thru the T-shirt sales, I want a couple for me and I'll have to get a couple of XXXXL for SWMBO so please make sure we have at least one style for big girls and boys, heck Mambo T-shirts sell for $55- each Get Reg Mombasa to do the artwork and I'll pay that at least once.
Coffee here in Geelong averages $3.50 a cup for expresso, so a cup a month equals AUD$42- I'd not want to go higher tho.
Regards
And please keep up the good work; I have learnt so much hear here hear
better revenue stream/model for diyAudio?
Is the question at hand, a better revenue stream/model for diyAudio? Or membership ideas only. I'll put in my $0.02, just rambling way too much here.
Tiered membership with fees ($10) seems fine, the cost of a (printed) electronics magazine these days. I would want more from the site though, in terms of how it's organized i.e. organizing swap meets/group listening sessions in my area, open source designs, categories are weakly defined- it's all tedious. All the info is here, but not well indexed and reading 1,000 posts is too time consuming. It seems little has changed since the BBS first came around in the 80's.
Open a diyAudio merchandise store (or partner with a store) for goods promoting the DIY'er like clothing, backpacks, mugs etc. etc.
Open a diyAudio store (or partner with a store or support a member's store) for electronics goods from projects/group builds here. Kits from some of the projects here would be awesome! Share profits with the designer or get open source designs working, so far the site lacks a format for that.
I like what SparkFun Electronics is doing, although they are "reverse" in that they sell parts- with their forums to support the parts and hobbyists. One game changer is they partnered with a cheap PCB manufacturer (BatchPCB) and offer royalties (to US citizens) if a designer's PCB sells.
If the "value" here is community and information, such as the diyAudio article His Master's Noise: A Thoroughly Modern Tube Phono Preamp - that is great to publish a project here, but then what. It's a prototype. Where are the PC boards, the bill of materials, the links to suppliers, some CNC machined front panels, oh please kit the thing so I don't have to hunt for each part etc.
There's so much more to making a gizmo than the discussion and I notice people's lives are quite busy, making a market for kits, especially for newbies.
That $100 eBay DAC Kit- Posts: 2,502 Views: 254,969 - there's an example of what the masses are into, but see how the forum is one massive thread. If I was interested in say adding a transformer to this, the search required is exhausting, some say it's fun but I calculate 125 minutes to read all those posts at 3 seconds/post. Over two hours of reading!
The ads here are somewhat quiet, I see no Amazon electronics/audio-topic book ads, no Hammond, Sowter, Jensen etc. and I guess it's limited by Google Ads. What about company's new product announcements, maybe a "what's new" page with a fee to advertisers.
If suppliers offer discounts to diyAudio members, that be incredible.
I'm going to shut up now but this is interesting, new ebusiness ideas.
Is the question at hand, a better revenue stream/model for diyAudio? Or membership ideas only. I'll put in my $0.02, just rambling way too much here.
Tiered membership with fees ($10) seems fine, the cost of a (printed) electronics magazine these days. I would want more from the site though, in terms of how it's organized i.e. organizing swap meets/group listening sessions in my area, open source designs, categories are weakly defined- it's all tedious. All the info is here, but not well indexed and reading 1,000 posts is too time consuming. It seems little has changed since the BBS first came around in the 80's.
Open a diyAudio merchandise store (or partner with a store) for goods promoting the DIY'er like clothing, backpacks, mugs etc. etc.
Open a diyAudio store (or partner with a store or support a member's store) for electronics goods from projects/group builds here. Kits from some of the projects here would be awesome! Share profits with the designer or get open source designs working, so far the site lacks a format for that.
I like what SparkFun Electronics is doing, although they are "reverse" in that they sell parts- with their forums to support the parts and hobbyists. One game changer is they partnered with a cheap PCB manufacturer (BatchPCB) and offer royalties (to US citizens) if a designer's PCB sells.
If the "value" here is community and information, such as the diyAudio article His Master's Noise: A Thoroughly Modern Tube Phono Preamp - that is great to publish a project here, but then what. It's a prototype. Where are the PC boards, the bill of materials, the links to suppliers, some CNC machined front panels, oh please kit the thing so I don't have to hunt for each part etc.
There's so much more to making a gizmo than the discussion and I notice people's lives are quite busy, making a market for kits, especially for newbies.
That $100 eBay DAC Kit- Posts: 2,502 Views: 254,969 - there's an example of what the masses are into, but see how the forum is one massive thread. If I was interested in say adding a transformer to this, the search required is exhausting, some say it's fun but I calculate 125 minutes to read all those posts at 3 seconds/post. Over two hours of reading!
The ads here are somewhat quiet, I see no Amazon electronics/audio-topic book ads, no Hammond, Sowter, Jensen etc. and I guess it's limited by Google Ads. What about company's new product announcements, maybe a "what's new" page with a fee to advertisers.
If suppliers offer discounts to diyAudio members, that be incredible.
I'm going to shut up now
but this is interesting, new ebusiness ideas.
What?? You start the pot boiling and then turn the heat down???
I am with you on the kit thing as I am a total klutz at electronics and have stuffed up a couple of chip-amp kits.
I think you will find that a discount may already be available from some suppliers but not heavily marketed.
But I like the current free advice on offer and the total willingness to share expertise; you don't get that too often.
GTG's should be more often I agree, wait till I buy an old church and I will host as many as I can ; until then what do you suggest??
I am with you on the kit thing as I am a total klutz at electronics and have stuffed up a couple of chip-amp kits.
I think you will find that a discount may already be available from some suppliers but not heavily marketed.
But I like the current free advice on offer and the total willingness to share expertise; you don't get that too often.
GTG's should be more often I agree, wait till I buy an old church and I will host as many as I can ; until then what do you suggest??
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