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Patreon question cuz I’ve never used it before, can I make a one-time donation or is the monthly recurring donation the only way to go? I get why the monthly recurring is probably better for UP, but a one-time works better for me ATM.
ETA: I’ll read this thread in more detail later today but looks like PayPal is an option.
I think you can set up a Patreon and then cancel it. But I don’t believe Patreon supports an easy-to-use one-time payment option. Easy alternative is to donate through PayPal using PayPal.Me
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I’m slightly reluctant to be a nag, and I have absolutely zero concerns about where the money is, still, I think regular reporting of the balance, revenue, donations and expenditures is a vital part of being treasurer. Like, monthly or something.
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WHAT ARE YOU ACCUSING ME OF?
Just kidding - you’re totally right. I’ll put something up tonight and make a calendar reminder to do it monthly.
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Ok, I’ll do my best going forward to post at the beginning of each month. Here’s where we stand now:
Incoming:
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We currently have 20 donors on Patreon, generating $123/month. This number has gone up and down over time as we’ve had some people beginning to donate and other people who have chosen to stop donating. (I will only reveal who donates and who chooses to stop donating if they give me permission.)
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We occasionally have someone donate via a one-time amount via paypal, but that’s pretty infrequent. It’s happened 5 times in 2020. (The most recent of those was in July from someone who is refusing to take credit for it. Since I cannot link the paypal account to particular user names, I am unable to confirm who it is. This is very frustrating to me.) This count of 5 also includes the Skyline Chili gift card. No, @SensiblePerson, I have not yet used it. Believe me, this site will be informed when I do.
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We have been running ads and currently have a little more than $300 Canadian in that ad account, if I understood @zikzak correctly in his last message to me. There’s some question about whether/how we can actually transfer that amount into an account that we actually control. (We had a similar issue with Google ad money that we were never able to get our hands on.) That’s a question for @zikzak, though, as I don’t control or access the advertising account.
Expenses:
Zikzak is paying $40/month for hosting fees and I am reimbursing him quarterly.
In the Bank
- $88.07 in a Paypal account that is in my name
- $1,274.12 in a Patreon account that I have access to. I have not yet transferred any money out of this account, but at some point I’ll have to in order to keep reimbursing @zikzak (unless a bunch of money comes in through Paypal).
- So that’s $1,362.19 that we definitely have access to. Plus the expected value of whatever we can get from the ad account.
Looking forward:
I’m enormously grateful to everyone who contributes, but I’m slightly concerned that the health of this site depends on such a concentrated few. For now, this doesn’t seem to be an issue, but I think we’re going to have to increase site capacity at least temporarily for the upcoming debates and election period. So I’m expecting that monthly expenses will pop up to $60 or $80 in the near future, but that’s just a guess on my part. And I continue to hope that we’ll attract new users.
Edit: I may be overreacting on the extra capacity - zikzak tells me we’re still well within our current plan, even during recent levels of high activity.
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Okay, thanks for the update! 
I think we should all try to think about ways to attract new users. I don’t have any bright ideas myself, but maybe someone else might have an idea.
Make texts to 30303 direct to UP
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I never used Patreon. Does our real life info get revealed?
My mother-in-Law is wearing one of our shirts and promising/threatening to sell shirts and promote the site. I’m not sure she and her cohort are up for participating online like this (I do her tech support) though.
I just showed her the shirt because her granddaughter is the artist.
Mil,
If you’re reading this, uh, welcome to UP!
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I guess you have my email already, yolo.
I’ll sign back up i stopped when I took my break.
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So that’s what happened to my nice t shirt.
I didn’t like to ask.
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I normally tell people who donate or are considering donating that they can view me as relatively trustworthy because I have a semi-public profile and the mods know how to contact me in real life if necessary. But I just realized that’s not true. I think the admins (particularly @microbet, @anon46587892, and @zikzak) know who I am, but not the group of moderators.
That seems ok to me, but I realized I’ve unintentionally been lying to people. Everyone cool with the situation where admins know who I am, but mods don’t necessarily?
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Fine with me since micro crushes raw eggs with his bare hands so you really don’t want to cross him.
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September update:
Incoming:
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Currently have 23 donors on Patreon that I believe should be generating $143/month. September looks very strange (it’s only about $90), but I hope that has something to do with Patreon’s billing at the beginning of each month. Currently a balance of $1,406.57 in the Patreon account that I have access to.
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2 donations via Paypal last month, bringing total Paypal balance to $158.07. The Paypal account is in my name.
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@zikzak can update the ad account - I don’t have access to that.
Expenses:
We’re still running $40/month, which @zikzak pays and I reimburse him for. The last time I paid him was $120 for the quarter on 7/1, so he’s due for another $120 at the end of September.
Thanks to everyone for donating - don’t forget to try to bring in new members!
Finally, I still have not used the skyline chili gift card, although I will probably be doing so this month. Can’t wait.
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Canned Skyline Chili is one of my all time favorite stocking stuffers.
ETA - thank you for your services.
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I’m withdrawing my Patreon contributions
if you don’t spend this damn gift card.