WatchI have been thinking about how to do this. I really love this site. I wonder what we could do. Could we help with the news links? Could we come up with a tipping convention such that each new poster sends a dollar? Patrick, how many daily readers do you have? When did you first start collecting for 2011? FWIW I set the thirty dollars sitting in my paypal account. What about changing the price for the "really worth" service?
Can you get non-profit status for providing a public service? Would that help?
Maybe a telethon somehow!
I really appreciate what you do!
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elliemae's website
I thought that magnets & coffee mugs would be cool - but he'd have to lay out some up front money so that might be out. But people are on here all the time and if the 20,000 readers all donated $5.00... I'm no math major, but... that's alot.
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I want a coffee mug shaped like a house! Is it 20000 readers? You are right. Easy math. Small fee. How do we get them to cough it up?
Do we know when he started collecting. He is at 10% of his goal and the year isn't started. That is somewhat encouraging!
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What about a way to look up how much each poster has donated to the site? Not posted like the number of posts or comments, but a button to click on to see how much a person has donated. Could generate a little social pressure. Especially for those mean guys who post a million back-and-forth messages yelling at each other. They could scoff at each other for not bothering to pay the freight on thei bile they post.
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Thanks for the proactive help Paula!
> Could we help with the news links?
Yes, there should be some way. That's the biggest chunk of my time, probably 4 hours per day lately. I tried to create some kind of voting system for links once but the spammers were gaming it immediately. So I'd have to have a voting system on the voters too.
> Could we come up with a tipping convention such that each new poster sends a dollar?
Posts are valuable anyway, just because it's usually good content which draws readers. So posting is already donating in a way.
> Patrick, how many daily readers do you have?
About 700,000 page views per month, from 14,000 daily web readers. Another 4,600 get the news links by email.
> When did you first start collecting for 2011?
Just three or four days ago. So it's been a great success so far, but falling off quickly.
> FWIW I set the thirty dollars sitting in my paypal account.
Thanks!
> What about changing the price for the “really worth” service?
The thing about lower prices is that I'm afraid having lots of customers means lots of customer service, which becomes unprofitable because of the time it takes. But one-off reports for specific addresses might work, if I can automate it well.
> Can you get non-profit status for providing a public service? Would that help?
I probably should do that just to be certain the donations are non-taxable. Currently, it's a grey area of law. Gifts are non-taxable, defined as something you give for no specific compensation. Whether blog donations are gifts has not been settled. Anyway, my income will probably be low enough that I wouldn't pay taxes anyway. That's the one advantage of having a bad year.
> Maybe a telethon somehow!
I'm embarrassed about being a charity case though.
> I really appreciate what you do!
That's a great reward, and really what kept me doing it. I get lots of email from people who tell me I helped convince them not to buy and they saved a lot of money.
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Patrick says
Maybe a work-group of identified users, so that you could screen people in. A bit of an executive decision would seem fine by me, if the voting system was too onerous to set up.
Gotcha. Makes sense.
I think you should run the link through the news feed weekly. I don't see this as you being a charity case as much as a gentle reminder that we can all help. Really, I don't see you as a charity case at all. I see you as a guy providing a very valuable service who is trying to sustain that valuable service. Not an ounce of charity in that.
This is going to sound goofy, but could the work-group do some of the responding to the service? Alternately, I think you could be a little less responsive with the service. You may be doing too good a job of that :-) It is like you developed this cool community organization with a community of one doing all the work to sustain it.
I don't mean to be too repetitive here, but this doesn't at all strike me as charity. The telethon would be for the service to continue, not a reflection on you! (News links to continue in 72 hours after visitors donate one dollar each!) Clearly you are a clever guy. I hope you don't mind me posting about this. Not trying to embarrass you. I just want to solve this!
How about some kind of 1 dollar express pay link that makes it super easy to pay a small fee?
An android ap that shows the real worth of homes based on your location?
What about a public speaking service? I suspect that people would pay to have you speak to their community organizations.
I will stop thinking aloud here in a minute ;-p
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Get William Shatner to narrate the Crash Page Article, or Seth Green to do a Robot Chicken using the dialog from some of the better classic posts.
I'd buy that DVD.
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elliemae says
Actually the average donation amount has been $33.46, based on $11,311 with 338 donors. Using Patrick figures, the average Donation was $29 a person, jumped up to $43, then $31 and is currently $37. Given how cheap people are, $11k is an impressive amount for a free forum. 100k is wishful thinking, but 15K is obtainable. Patrick really needs to subsidize his income with other sources, and if that means some advertising, so be it.
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There is a link somewhere on the front page for donations. I just havent had time to do it, will probably sometime later during the week.
We can all promote the site on facebook for a while? Promote the site, certain portion will donate.
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ChrisLosAngeles says
What's Facebook?
Seriously thou, I created an account so I could post on a news story. If you see a Facebook page named Mike Smith, it's mine. no details, that's not even my last name.
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TechGromit says
What, John Doe was taken already?
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I posted the keep it alive link to my facebook. When ever anyone mentions buying a house in Bay Area, I promptly send them a link. This site falls into the realm of priceless!
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What are you folks talking about, keep Patrick alive?...all the ramblings have confused the hell out of me.
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donations? Was I supposed to donate for my ability to post?....seriously, I am confused.
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Patrick is in need of funds to keep this site going. If you feel you have benefited from reading this site or that it is a service that should continue, donations are welcome and encouraged!
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elliemae's website
Clarence 13X says
It costs money to keep this site going, not to menition time & energy.
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46 male
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I consider posts and comments to be donations in themselves! Well, as long as they're polite and say something useful.
Seriously, good content is worth something. I should make a "best of" section for the best posts and comments.
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Patrick says
Patrick actually owes me for sharing my genius ideas on this site. See my "National Debt Is Meaningless" for exhibit A.
Patrick says
Doh! There's the rub.
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Fairfax, VA
Patrick says
since u normally have under 20 new links each day couldn't u take the links u get and implement a count feature with a priority placement on active posters?
ie IF someone with say 15 comments or 5 posts emails u a link then u count the number of times u got that link from anyone and sort highest to lowest. i mean i don't see a lot of fake user accounts with posts and while u might miss a very obscure news it would require u only looking at the MOST reported links where u know the links are valid....if the link hasn't already been posted and not in the top 15 most received in the past week you wouldn't even need to read it.
the only thing is if someone sends u a link 10 times it grabs your attention, but u could then blacklist links u dont like and never look at them again
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Related question: How much of a cut does PayPal take?
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46 male
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They take 3% plus 30 cents.
So if someone donates a dollar, Paypal gets 33 cents of that, which is 33%.
But if someone donates ten dollars, Paypal gets 60 cents, which is 6%.
And if someone donates 100 dollars, Paypal gets 3.30, which is 3.3%.
So it's very biased against small payments, unfortunately. But so is the use of an envelope and a stamp I guess.
The bigger question for me now is whether donations to a blog are gifts as defined by the IRS. Gifts are non-taxable:
http://www.irs.gov/publications/p950/ar02.html#en_US_publink100099451
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PersainCAT says
Yes, that sounds like a pretty good way to do it. I actually look at about 50 links each day and pick just the 20 best, or fewer. Most of them get sent to me just once, but a few get sent a lot.
So then, I'd have a web page where they paste in the links? Or heck, maybe a toolbar? That's a lot of work to create though.
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Based on a quick search, it looks like the donations are more viewed as tips (income) than gifts. But like you said, it doesn't seem to be a settled area.
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Can't Patrick.net be established as a non-profit?
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If so it has to have a board and an executive director (==Patrick).
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The problem with being a non-profit is that I'm also trying hard to make a profit with my "What's it really worth?" service. I'd rather be able to support the site with income from a service than from donations.
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Patrick says
Ok, I assumed all the sites coding was completed and you had to tweak it here and there in your spare time. Hell we all come here to rant and rave about things we dont know in attempt to learn from each other and you. You are the product, just like Jay-Z and PDiddy...get out their and sell.
Can't you cut back on development of the site and invest more time into marketing the site on the news?
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plus....we need an IPHONE app because I am tired of refuting BAP33 and SHREKGRINCH on my darn computer everytime we disagree on a point.
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Fairfax, VA
Patrick says
if most get sent only once then im not sure how much it'd help save time in the long run. the best/simplest way long term for u then is most likely to go the voting method. add a link a the top of the news to a "submit a link" page. that page can then have a list of all links less then X days old for users to vote on, then each day u simply go to that list choose the top few + anything else and add them to the daily news, keeping a list of old links not to use.
At the top have add box which requires users be lodged in and let them rate the article 0-10 (msg page for link already exists), I personally dislike an up/down vote system. best method if you trust active posters is "user class"*0-10 score. thus the people who post more and keep the community alive have more impact on what the community reads.
user class is more work but u can set a zero class for anyone registered but could be a spammer so anyone can submit a link.
i know the whole process would take a bit to code (i only know java, fortran and vba but i'd guess 10-12 hours), but in the long run i bet u'd get down to under 20 min a day on the news
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This site is awesomely awesome
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@Patrick
I was checking out this guys podcasts on macklessonsradio.com. He sells books on being a mackdaddy, and markets them using his podcasts to his listeners. He sells podcasts, dvd's to his followers and there is nothing wrong with you doing the same.
Here are my thoughts...
1. I think you should consider writing a book on making a sound real estate investment then selling it on the site? I am sure of the 100,000 hits you get every month you can sell at least 1 book plus you already have a majority of the material written on your site.
2. You should start a free 1 hour Podcast and advertise your book there? I am looking for advice on how to locate real estate but dont know where to turn. I am sure you would have 100s of callers dialing in for your advice.
3. Also a Pay per view 3 hour podcast on some form of real estate knowledge monthly would be financially worth your while? You have 100k? hits a month, take advantage of them.
Good luck
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...dont ask why i want to be a mackdaddy.
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Thanks Clarence. I do intend to write a book about real estate and sell it on the site. First I want to get my real estate data service more functional, but after that, the book.
I actuall did review a book on nursing homes that Elliemae wrote, and I've been selling that on the site. Sold 7 copies so far:
http://patrick.net/nursing/survival.html
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Patrick says
The problem with writing a book is that it takes forever. I thought I was done many times, only to find out that I wasn't. But I am now... Getting it right is damn hard.
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I also wrote a book once. Well twice, since I did a second edition:
http://www.amazon.com/Web-Performance-Tuning-OReilly-Internet/dp/059600172X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1296066777&sr=8-1
Took me forever too. First edition was a whole year of evenings and weekends.
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San Leandro, CA
illustrateth's website
What about a Zazzle store? You could link to it from this site and get the referral fees as well. People have already suggested bumper stickers. . .
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bg1 says
Yes, I plan to relauch it for a much lower price. Probably on Monday.
I should definitely make bumper stickers, etc, but I think those places like Zazzle take too much of the price. Maybe I can do it more directly.
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Beverly Hills, CA
I've been looking into this type of marketing stuff too and there appears to be zero profit potential (for me).
You can buy a tshirt printer etc, but its just a giant pain in the ass, and competition for this kind of work is intense, which keeps prices low and makes it a bad investment. If you are doing any kind of bulk, you can't compete.
I've pretty much given up on it and will run a cafepress shop for little/no gain, rather than spend all my time not doing what I started out to do. I consider it a balanced budget for marketing.
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San Leandro, CA
illustrateth's website
I do think they take a lot too, but you also have no overhead, and no inventory that doesn't sell. They also have a referral program, so you can up your percentage of the profit that way as well. I think their terms are fairer then CafePress and you retain the copyright. With two little kids, I like being able to take a small chunk of time to design something and then have it online for sale. I don't have time to have inventory and keep track of mailing things to people. So. . until a competitor with a lower profit margin comes up, I think they're one of the better PODs for now.
What I can't figure out is how people are affording stuff when the item prices seem a bit high.
Printfection is pretty good for lower prices though - they just don't have too much besides t-shirts.
For an example of what can be done. . This guy has some really nice stores set up:
http://www.webomator.com/2011/03/28/two-day-t-shirt-sale-at-the-retropolis-transit-authority-and-saga-shirts/