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Originally Posted by Peer
Allthough I own and run a forum that could easily overtake the functions of Avalon where nobody has to pay (because of the low servercosts: about $100.- a year and of which I will not place a link here) I will pay for the servercosts of Avalon (even cheaper than my own forum) if the owners think they can't afford it.
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I hear a lot of talk about 'server costs' and 'bandwidth costs' While this was true years ago... I suggest people do a little research. My hosting company that I will link to is charging me 166.00 for TWO years... This includes FIVE(5) domain names hosted on the SAME account ( a one time fee of 12.00 if you want a pointer, no fee if its a separate site)
For this I have 5 TERABYTES of storage, 5 TERABYTES of transfer per month. Upgrades of 1 TERABYTE are one time fee of 49.00...
So far my usage needle has not even flickered...
http://globat.com
So the issue is not server space... Now if they need travel expenses that is a different matter...
ADS
Who really cares? Yahoo, Myspace, Google all have them. ATS has one at the top and one at the side... Though ATS has it in their terms of use NOT to use ad blocker... well who will stop you? (if you have no honor
)
Do you know how much money ad revenue is worth? Check out
http://www.dnscoop.com/
This site calculates the value of placing an ad on a site... I have already turned down two offers that came to me to put ads on my site...
ATS lists at $251,600.00
Myspace lists at $1,124,200,000.00
Yahoo lists at $1,280,000,000.00
Google lists at $1,776,000,000.00
Here is the single ad link value for ATS... the Big sites cannot even calculate it..
The estimated value of a single link on abovetopsecret.com is: $117 /month
If you were to sell 8 links on abovetopsecret.com, you could generate $936/month in revenue for your website.
Welcome to the REAL world
Currently Camelot.org is at $18,530.00
Last time I checked and posted this a few weeks ago it was $4,234.00
The estimated value of a single link on projectcamelot.org is: $29 /month
If you were to sell 8 links on projectcamelot.org, you could generate $232/month in revenue for your website.
I hear people at ATS always complain about those sharing information and writing a book to "make money" as if that was evil... yet those same people don't seem to have an issue with ATS being worth hundreds of millions...
ATS also runs a store...
ATS GEAR
http://www.cafepress.com/abovetopsecret
ONE coffee mug with Logo... $12.99
http://www.cafepress.com/abovetopsecret.27020138
Long Sleeve Dark Conspiracy T-Shirt... $24.99http://www.cafepress.com/abovetopsecret.88398235
Total ATS member accounts: 149,144
If every member not counting guests buys just ONE mug...
12.99 times 149,144 equals $1,937,380.56
Avalon currently has 4940 members
12.99 times 4940 equals $64,170.60
I would gladly by a coffee mug... at least I would have some value for my support...
HOWEVER If Avalon is making that kind of money on 'selling' my work (posts) I might want to consider getting a 'piece of the action'
This is one of the MAIN POINTS people miss when a site goes subscription...
The material that makes a forum interesting enough to be paid for... is provided FOR FREE by the members... if there was no member content... provide by people that wish to share the truth... there would be NO REASON to be here let alone pay for it...
I spend long hard hours researching and posting in various forums...
Those of you that know my work can see that...
I offer this time FOR FREE...
If someone was making millions of dollars (like ATS) on work I provide free of charge, as well as MY BANDWIDTH and server space where I host the images etc for my posts I would have to seriously reconsider my participation.
The only reason I still post at ATS knowing the money they make... is because the MEMBERS still get my info free... and I have many a LOT of contacts through my work there... people like John Lear, Russ Hamerly from Boeing, and Edgar Mitchell... to name a few...
This is payback for my work that I can live with
Two contributors to Pegasus opted out of sharing articles with us when the went strictly subscription... One was Ellen Llyod of UFO Area...
http://www.ufoarea.com/
Subscription at Avalon?
I am outta here...
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Furthermore I contribute to this forum as much as I can, bringing in my knowledge and good vibrations and I am not going to pay for being allowed to share my abundance.
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A VERY good point to add to my statement above
You have to pay to contribute free content... uh huh sounds like a great idea...
Uh yeah right
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The one who came up with this idea should be ashamed.
No way Jose!
We have our own Ark to build in Europe as well !!
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PS If ya go for the store idea I expect a free mug and an autographed T-Shirt for showing you the numbers
