How to make a donation for the boards server fund

[frostfire 843]

Hi Guys,

 

Due to multiple requests I am adding a way for members to donate to the board's server fund.

 

Donations are NOT necessary, and will not grant any additional access whatsoever - this is a free site, and always will be. That said, nothing in life is truly free and the board itself (and its dedicated server) do cost money. I have been paying that fee myself for the last year and more, and Martin paid it for years before that. I will be working on getting some advertising sponsors to defray the costs, but in any case the board is not in any danger of being closed down - I will not let that happen. Help will be graciously accepted however :)

 

The link below (the button I wanted to add made me lose my last post' text when I tried to add it in here and go to post preview - stupid me), will take you to PayPal and allow you to make a donation in any amount you wish. Any amount is acceptable - even as little as $5 will add up very quickly and is greatly appreciated.

 

When you do go to that link, there will be a textbox that asks for your board name. Only put this in there if you wish your name to appear here with the amount you donated. Alternately you can PM me and I will put something custom or nothing at all.

 

A huge thank you to anyone willing to donate.

 

Frosty

 

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=UUKMRXXYC397W

 

 

Donations to date:

 

BigusDicus- $100 (cash)

anonymous - $25.00 (paypal) 42F494178T911294Y

MrMango - $50.00 (paypal) 2BJ800147X045574W

TheFiend - $25.00 (paypal) 8MC97826CM389073R

Billions - $25.00 (paypal) 5R651566F27289739

Jacko - $50.00 (paypal) 3UW21447AW425004F

anonymous - $100.00 (paypal) 35550252B3168245N

CatBear - $20.00 (paypal) 33469836NM999410M

Total: $395.00 USD, or enough for 4 months or more. Much better than I had hoped! Thank you much guys. Side note: The ID numbers after each donation are a unique identifier from paypal, but only usable by the sender and receiver - so do not pose a security risk.

[BigusDicus 2,421]

Frosty has spent years helping Martin with this board. Frosty in effect took over the costs associated with running this board a couple years ago when Martin needed to pay medical bills instead of supporting the site . I believe Martin felt very close to Frosty and wished him to continue the board. That is why Martin left Frosty the necessary passwords to do so.

 

I am a businessman. I know what can happen when an entity is sold or control of transferred to another entity. The new owners can effect whatever change they like. And if they sell to someone else, the new owners too can change things.

 

I was low on baht last night. I took Frosty aside and gave him my emergency $100 bill I carry with me to help. I have been a member of the board for around ten years. $10 per year for what I have received is nothing! I pledge to continue donations of at least $10 per year. If everyone else on this board donated a few baht a year....

[frostfire 843]

Frosty has spent years helping Martin with this board. Frosty in effect took over the costs associated with running this board a couple years ago when Martin needed to pay medical bills instead of supporting the site . I believe Martin felt very close to Frosty and wished him to continue the board. That is why Martin left Frosty the necessary passwords to do so.

 

I am a businessman. I know what can happen when an entity is sold or control of transferred to another entity. The new owners can effect whatever change they like. And if they sell to someone else, the new owners too can change things.

 

I was low on baht last night. I took Frosty aside and gave him my emergency $100 bill I carry with me to help. I have been a member of the board for around ten years. $10 per year for what I have received is nothing! I pledge to continue donations of at least $10 per year. If everyone else on this board donated a few baht a year....

 

As an aside, its the first time I've seen one of those new bills. When I saw it under light I was like... is this real? lol. Looks kinda like monopoly cash

 

I really need to make a trip back to the US soon. I've left Thailand many times over the decade I've been here, but always to nearby countries either with friends or to sort out the odd visa. Never been back stateside. Really hate those long ass flights in coach, and business is just too darn expensive to be worth it. But enough with getting sidetracked - the donation is sincerely appreciated. Now just gotta remember how those exchange booths work

[MrMango 460]

Hi Guys,

 

Due to multiple requests I am adding a way for members to donate to the board's server fund.

 

Donations are NOT necessary, and will not grant any additional access whatsoever - this is a free site, and always will be. That said, nothing in life is truly free and the board itself (and its dedicated server) do cost money. I have been paying that fee myself for the last year and more, and Martin paid it for years before that. I will be working on getting some advertising sponsors to defray the costs, but in any case the board is not in any danger of being closed down - I will not let that happen. Help will be graciously accepted however :)

 

The link below (the button I wanted to add made me lose my last post' text when I tried to add it in here and go to post preview - stupid me), will take you to PayPal and allow you to make a donation in any amount you wish. Any amount is acceptable - even as little as $5 will add up very quickly and is greatly appreciated.

 

When you do go to that link, there will be a textbox that asks for your board name. Only put this in there if you wish your name to appear here with the amount you donated. Alternately you can PM me and I will put something custom or nothing at all.

 

A huge thank you to anyone willing to donate.

 

Frosty

 

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=UUKMRXXYC397W

Here is $50 and thanks.

[frostfire 843]

Here is $50 and thanks.

Cheers!

[short 178]

Is this treated as a cash advance or material purchase by Paypal?

 

If it is a cash advance, then the credit card company may charge an additional fee. If it is a material purchase, then the donor can get frequent flyer miles.

[frostfire 843]

Is this treated as a cash advance or material purchase by Paypal?

 

If it is a cash advance, then the credit card company may charge an additional fee. If it is a material purchase, then the donor can get frequent flyer miles.

It is a payment to a merchant (PayPal), so it is likely considered a material purchase by the credit card company, and will likely work for miles depending on your terms of service. It is not a cash advance, so that fee would not apply.

 

PayPal does charge a percentage, but it is fairly small and comes out of my end, not yours.

[TheFiend 741]

Sent a small donation to the fund......

[short 178]

It is a payment to a merchant (PayPal), so it is likely considered a material purchase by the credit card company, and will likely work for miles depending on your terms of service. It is not a cash advance, so that fee would not apply.

 

PayPal does charge a percentage, but it is fairly small and comes out of my end, not yours.

 

Once you know what percentage you are being charged, let us know so that we can cover that also.

 

 

Also, we need to cover the amount you spent since you started paying the expenses. We need to be paying you for your labor for board administration also.

[TheFiend 741]

Just a couple of suggestions, perhaps this would be more visible posted in the main forum.... and perhaps a larger font on the banner announcement at the top of the page....

[frostfire 843]

 

Once you know what percentage you are being charged, let us know so that we can cover that also.

 

 

Also, we need to cover the amount you spent since you started paying the expenses. We need to be paying you for your labor for board administration also.

 

I don't expect all that. Like I said, a little bit here and there will help, but its not required by any means. I knew when I offered to take over costs from Martin that I would take a small hit on it, at least initially. In the past he was leasing a dedicated server. That was most of the cost - bandwidth was only about ~$50 or so per month. I flat out bought a new server for this ($2400 as memory serves) - which is a very modest server as far as servers go (my largest server cost ~$25000), and so my only expense is the bandwidth and maintenance. And like I said before, I really have no idea how much that equates out to each month. I could monitor it, and will do eventually, but I do not currently monitor any of my servers bandwidth usages, aside from a master total at the end of each month (which is how they bill me). I know there are cheaper hosts out there that will give "unlimited bandwidth" for a fixed fee, but I have yet to find one of those that are both reliable and allow truly unmetered access to the pipe. Most of them connect via a CAT-5 cable (100mb/s), which is way too slow for some of my operations - and others have back ends that limit speeds to reduce costs. My servers are all connected directly to multiple providers via 10gb/s fiber, and even if I found another host that would be cheaper, it would be an unmitigated nightmare to try to move all my servers to a new host. I currently have 2 full racks of servers at my host in the US. Anyway - too much geek talk lol. My whole idea here is to partially defray the costs going forward - not looking backward.

 

There were several donations last night - but it seems that paypal is not asking what the board name is? At least that's what one message told me... ill look in to that. Soon as I finish work today I will update the OP with the donations to date, but amounts only unless there is a supporting post about it by the person that made the donation so I know who it was. I do not for obvious reasons want to post the email of the people here, but I will put the amount and date.

[jacko 5,975]

 

 

 

There were several donations last night - but it seems that paypal is not asking what the board name is?

I did see a field where you could enter it, but you are not prompted or forced through it.

Then after I completed my browser came back with an error message gobbledygook screen.. but I got a Paypal message saying it had gone through.

Edited February 26, 2018 by jacko

[SlipSlopSlap 186]

I would vote for advertisements. We are all use to ads on sites as a means to cover costs for sites we want to look at for free. Or a business(s) like Pattaya Beer Garden that wanted to support the forum financially for the business it would generate.

 

I think there would be scope for interesting advertising possibilities...

 

More youtube clips from PT supporting businesses that were clearly adverting and acknowledged as such.

 

Merchandise/competitions/freebies from PT supporting businesses (run BY those businesses, not taking up the time of PT admin)

 

Naming rights for one of the forums (hell, our sports stadiums make money out of it... 'The Pattaya Beer Garden member's bar'

 

Hell, I would even suffer the occasional spam email from a PT supporting business (and before everyone jumps all over me, EVERY type of site I want to have a look at requires me to register my email and then get spam from that site...I would suffer spam from a site like PT that I actually like.)

 

Subscription won't work. Their is so much information/porn/guides etc on the internet for free that I just wouldn't be bothered.

 

Thanks for your efforts Frostfire and I would just like to say Vale MM.

Edited February 27, 2018 by SlipSlopSlap

[frostfire 843]

Original post updated with donations to date. Much better than I had hoped, tho I would have much rather seen more people put in less each. I will do my best to enhance the board and make it worthy :)

[CalEden 101]

I also got the invalid server page after making my donation in PayPal and being redirected back to Simple Payment Solutions web page. PayPal confirmed my donation.

[Butch 2,944]

Frosty

I've put through a donation but the page failed to display with a confirmation, instead I got a corrupted SQL server page. If it didn't go through can you please let me know asap so I can sort it out please?.

[frostfire 843]

Not sure whats up with the bad redirect page. Ill check that out. I suspect it has to do with it being a donation and not a payment - I doubt i programmed my receipt page to deal with that lol. Oops.

 

Butch, I am sure it went thru. At least I did get one yesterday. Later tonight ill go thru and add them to the original post so you can be sure.

 

Frosty

[short 178]

Frostfire or one of the mods, can you determine how many major users of the board there are so that we get a better feel of how much is need from each. If there are only 20 major users, then we would need to contribute about $100/each a year on average.

[thinkingallowed 39]

Frostfire or one of the mods, can you determine how many major users of the board there are so that we get a better feel of how much is need from each. If there are only 20 major users, then we would need to contribute about $100/each a year on average.

They are going through the same thing on Live and I would suggest that about 50% of heavy users have been willing to contribute.

[frostfire 843]

Frostfire or one of the mods, can you determine how many major users of the board there are so that we get a better feel of how much is need from each. If there are only 20 major users, then we would need to contribute about $100/each a year on average.

 

That is one of the things I am going to find out. It will take some time to get everything sorted. My first priority is to get the board upgraded to the latest version, which looks like its going to be one hell of a big job. I remember talking to Martin about it back in the day when he tried and failed - and I remember thinking... well, shit... if I had the time I could do that pretty fast. lol. Oops.

 

So, I have a test server set up and I did a test port of the database and then did the upgrade, but so many things are broken that its hard to know even where to start fixing them. Then of course I need to keep a log of everything I fix and how it was fixed, and in some cases a file by file list of code changes (for the skin), so I can make those same changes again when I do the live port over for the real upgrade later. Its gonna be a nightmare lol.

 

But I do want to say again... I am not expecting or asking our members to carry the weight of this whole thing like that. I will find a neutral solution such as ads from bars etc. The results we have had already have been awesome. I plan on working on this most of the day today and tomorrow (weekend), and will update again.

[forcebwithu 1,179]

If there were a vote, I'd vote to stay with the current version of the forum software. Not worth the time, effort and hair pulling to upgrade, IMHO.

 

Edited to add: Would Phil at Le Pub be willing to accept cash donations for the board?

Edited March 3, 2018 by forcebwithu

[Bazle 843]

If there were a vote, I'd vote to stay with the current version of the forum software. Not worth the time, effort and hair pulling to upgrade, IMHO.

 

I am of the same opinion, but maybe there is no choice as I believe Invision no longer support this version.

[Butch 2,944]

If there were a vote, I'd vote to stay with the current version of the forum software. Not worth the time, effort and hair pulling to upgrade, IMHO.

 

Edited to add: Would Phil at Le Pub be willing to accept cash donations for the board

 

 

Good idea, so maybe along with a tip for the service, we could include 20 or so baht for the forum, or chuck a baht grenade into the PT pot if we're passing. The only problem is that it's a bit unfair for us to expect Phil to sort it all out as he's pretty busy running the bar.

[frostfire 843]

If there were a vote, I'd vote to stay with the current version of the forum software. Not worth the time, effort and hair pulling to upgrade, IMHO.

 

Edited to add: Would Phil at Le Pub be willing to accept cash donations for the board?

 

Ok, will tackle both of these one at a time.

 

First, the upgrade. Unfortunately unless we want the board to die a very slow death, upgrading is necessary. This version has not been supported for some time, which means that security patches are no longer being generated for it - but at the same time, just like with any software, more security holes are being found every month. This makes it easier and easier for hackers and spammers to access the board. As it is, we are currently unable to stop them from registering - we get up to 50 new spam accounts registered per day (average about 20 or so), and while we do stop most of them from actually submitting spam, we do not stop all of them - and there will be more and more as time goes on. Eventually someone will figure out how to crack user permission security at which point those new accounts will be able to access all our secure forums - not good! In short, its much better to upgrade, even if that means moving to a new reputation system (which is one of the hurdles)

 

As to Phil at Le Pub, I have not spoken to him about it yet, but based on our past discussions, I am sure it would be no problem. I will make it a point to get out there in the next couple days and have a couple beers talk to him about it.

[lanzalad 127]

 

That is one of the things I am going to find out. It will take some time to get everything sorted. My first priority is to get the board upgraded to the latest version, which looks like its going to be one hell of a big job. I remember talking to Martin about it back in the day when he tried and failed - and I remember thinking... well, shit... if I had the time I could do that pretty fast. lol. Oops.

 

So, I have a test server set up and I did a test port of the database and then did the upgrade, but so many things are broken that its hard to know even where to start fixing them. Then of course I need to keep a log of everything I fix and how it was fixed, and in some cases a file by file list of code changes (for the skin), so I can make those same changes again when I do the live port over for the real upgrade later. Its gonna be a nightmare lol.

 

But I do want to say again... I am not expecting or asking our members to carry the weight of this whole thing like that. I will find a neutral solution such as ads from bars etc. The results we have had already have been awesome. I plan on working on this most of the day today and tomorrow (weekend), and will update again.

 

so many things are broken

Yes thats normal if your running the 3.4 version and upgrading... on one upgrade i had 1,300,000 errors on the database but it was easily fixed

 

If you have cloned the live forum onto a test server, does the test forum before upgrading work fine..?

 

Did you covert the database on the old software or on the new software while doing the upgrade..?