Scientopia transitions
April 18, 2012
You will notice a new PayPal button on the sidebar of this blog and possibly other blogs around the Scientopia collective. Very likely you did not notice new amendments to our Code. The short version is, we finally have a way to handle money. This is good because it allows us to try to cover the operational costs of this blog collective which had heretofore been borne by a single member. It was thought that we should get our financial/tax/LLC/blahdeblah in order first and this apparently prevented even donations from ourselves to the cause.
We have apparently negotiated those rough waters. There are three issues on the table at the moment for your understanding and consideration.
First the button and my sidebar text: Your donation helps to support the operation of Scientopia – thanks for your consideration.
This is provided for anyone who would care to support Scientopia. Our expenses are the hosting and bandwidth charges, at the moment there is nobody getting paid to do anything service-related for the upkeep.
Second, the Scientopia schwag shop items now have a modest markup. Said markup will be routed into the Scientopia coffers.
Third, at some point in the future there will be ads on the blogs. Not sure who/what/how just yet, but it is in the works.
I won’t make the NPR style plea, you folks can do the maths for yourselves.
DrugMonkey 
April 18, 2012 at 10:14 am
[…] DrugMonkey has a much better explanation of why we at Scientopia need the paypal button, plus a preview of some upcoming changes. Also, did […]
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April 18, 2012 at 10:34 am
Groovy!
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April 18, 2012 at 10:38 am
Was I first to donate? I want a prize.
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April 18, 2012 at 11:24 am
Sorry to convey that I had a problem. Last time I made a donation to help with health expenses of little boy, somebody on internet managed to copy my data and in a matter of 3 days I had several charges (fraudulent) amounting to $300. I guess that there is nothing that can be done to avoid this.
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April 18, 2012 at 11:28 am
Was I first to donate? I want a prize.
I thank you for your support. ….but I don’t have the keys to that thing so I don’t know who is first, we have a Treasurer and all that jazz….
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April 18, 2012 at 1:11 pm
Well, I don’t really want a prize. (I really want a prize!) but it’s cool to be able to support a nifty endeavor like this.
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April 18, 2012 at 2:24 pm
Because I currently get the automated emails, I was able to see that yes indeed you were first!
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April 19, 2012 at 5:16 am
“Because I currently get the automated emails, I was able to see that yes indeed you were first!”
And, that comment should be prize enough, right?
BTW, in order to do the math, I need to know how much the endeavor is costing. Are you folks an actual 501c3 org? with annual reports and the like?
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April 19, 2012 at 5:59 am
The server costs vary with traffic levels but it is on the order of about $300 per month to my understanding.
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