2019 PoA site operations fundraiser - help keep PoA running (and free!)

jason

jason

Administrator
Management Council Member
Joined
Jul 4, 2006
Messages
5,128
Location
Lincoln, Nebraska
Display Name
Display name:
Jason W (FlyNE)
In April of 2017, we had a stated goal of collecting around two years worth of operating expenses to run this site. And we almost made it two years off of the last round of fundraising. That said, we're going to open up a fundraising period again and we humbly ask you to consider donating to help fund the operation of Pilots of America.

Some background: PoA is a nonprofit organization. Not a 501(c)3, but rather a state registered nonprofit. Nobody on the MC takes money for their work on this site. And I receive no compensation for my work on the infrastructure.

It costs us around $100/mo for the AWS resources necessary to keep the site running and backed up.

We would like to raise about two years worth of operating expenses. In addition, we need to raise enough to fund the renewal of the core software and some expenses related to registering the nonprofit organization with various government agencies (no political opinion stated and no political responses necessary :) ).

If you'd like to sport a fancy PoA Supporter badge like mine, we would very much appreciate a donation. Since we don't always ask for donations on an annual basis, I've changed around a couple of the levels to allow for more extended PoA Supporter status at higher donation tiers.

We expect to have some big news about our legal status as an organization in the coming months. Nothing will change regarding our nonprofit status, we just expect that status to be enhanced. Our end goal is to make PoA a great resource for pilots (and aviation in general) for generations to come.

Thanks!

Jason (on behalf of the PoA Management Council)

Click here to find the upgrades page... https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/account/upgrades
 
If you'd like to donate more than $100, please let me know and I can add a custom donation tier. :yes:

(Or you could just donate to one or more levels multiple times)
 
I donated but u can keep ur banner. someone should be able to give $1 or $20.
 
eman1200 said:
I donated but u can keep ur banner. someone should be able to give $1 or $20.
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Thank you for you donation!

PayPal takes the first $.30. While we're thankful for anything, the fees involved in processing that certainly lessen the impact of the donation. If somebody would like to donate less than $20 they can PM me. I'll send the email address for the PoA PayPal account and they can just send money directly to it.
 
How long Will site be up for donations? As I’m in Australia,and would feel more comfortable ,donating on my return ,to the states
 
frfly172 said:
How long Will site be up for donations? As I’m in Australia,and would feel more comfortable ,donating on my return ,to the states
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Probably for at least a week. Maybe two? Donations are processed by PayPal if that makes it any easier. No credit cards are entered (or touch our site).
 
I don’t need a banner, but if I give a hundred bucks can I sponsor August? It’s my birthday month.
 
A smart NFP would have done this in December...not January!

:cool:

But I gave anyway...
 
Proper E-Mail address please.
 
Worthwhile cause. I'm going to have to see if my PayPal account still works. I haven't used it in several years and I know that the cards associated with it are no longer valid.
 
The banner should have colors that reflect the amount donated. Like a status symbol. Separates the cheapskates from the high rollers.
 
Velocity173 said:
The banner should have colors that reflect the amount donated. Like a status symbol. Separates the cheapskates from the high rollers.
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Or a sticky showing the donors from high to low.

The mods give with their time... probably worth more than any of us give in cash.

I won't be giving as much this funding round as I did the last round. Would that I could.
 
I’ll give what I can. I enjoy the board, so I’m happy to help contribute.
 
I did not have PayPal dagnabit. Now to find out if my wife still has hers.

Sent from my SM-J737T using Tapatalk
 
Velocity173 said:
The banner should have colors that reflect the amount donated. Like a status symbol. Separates the cheapskates from the high rollers.
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Dumbest ****** idea evah!

Banners are stoopid. Gradated banners would be more idiotic yet.

This ain't kinnygarden.

But if it was, here are some ideas for you all.

CC87C91C-0A93-4297-A89D-CC606DC73C1F.png

...

F34FB3A6-15CD-4131-9C0C-567D67FFF66C.jpeg

...

A81237A4-3474-4854-A150-3C08DD0FD776.jpeg
 
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tspear said:
I did not have PayPal dagnabit. Now to find out if my wife still has hers.

Sent from my SM-J737T using Tapatalk
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Choose "pay with a credit card" instead of logging into PayPal.
 
timwinters said:
Dumbest ****** idea evah!

Banners are stoopid. Gradated banners would be more idiotic yet.

This ain't kinnygarden.

But if it was, here are some ideas for you all.
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Calm down, Tim. Nobody asked for a banner. It's a cheap (free) and fun way for us to thank those that have supported the site.

Thank you for giving!
 
jason said:
Calm down, Tim. Nobody asked for a banner.
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I was just being my typical smart*assed* self. I'm perfectly calm!

The current banners are okay but they give some here a reason to look down on others (something pilots excel at). It's happened before, albeit rarely, a statement is made that someone doesn't get to have an opinion because they have no banner.

And gradated banners for the purpose of separating "the high rollers from the cheapskates" would provide just another tool for the arrogant here to look down their royal noses at others.

Just sayin'

LOL at my new banner! :cool:

(BTW...I should be the leading contender here for the kindness award that I posted above!)

If even a moderate percentage of the regulars here gave $20, you guys would have ample funds to keep it running for a while. Come on folks!
 
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Hahahaha love Tims banner that’s great
 
timwinters said:
The current banners are okay but they give some here a reason to look down on others (something pilots excel at). It's happened before, albeit rarely, a statement is made that someone doesn't get to have an opinion because they have no banner.

And gradated banners for the purpose of separating "the high rollers from the cheapskates" would provide just another tool for the arrogant here to look down their royal noses at others.
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Tim - we have no intention of implementing a graduated system of banners. Except for the fact that it riles you up, there is no benefit to it. Okay, well riling you up is a BIG benefit.

We hope that members donate out of the goodness of their hearts and because they genuinely appreciate the board for its content, and not to have superiority because of a small, overlooked banner. I'm also certain everyone donating could not care less about the banner, but it's our small (small),way to say thanks for donating.
 
I might donate just to get the banner so I can look down upon the peasants :p

Just kidding.
 
jason said:
It costs us around $100/mo for the AWS resources necessary to keep the site running and backed up.
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Holy cow. What, is it just EC2+RDS running the site? Not the most cost effective way to use AWS ;-)
 
mkosmo said:
Holy cow. What, is it just EC2+RDS running the site? Not the most cost effective way to use AWS ;-)
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$21/mo for a reserved instance t2.medium
$25(ish)/mo for the related block storage (AMIs, instance and EBS snapshots, EBS for backups, etc.)
$30(ish)/mo for bandwidth
$3-5/mo for Route53
+Cloudwatch
+Config
+SES
+GuardDuty
+<a smattering of other things>

It all adds up. That's the beauty of the AWS business model. :D

I'm not even using RDS (yet). Been thinking of trying out serverless Aurora for elasticity. We use very few resources off hours.

It could obviously be done differently. I could be utilizing spot instances, etc. Hell, I'd love to weave in Cloudfront. To date, I've prioritized *extreme* simplicity over saving a few bucks here and there. The more complicated we get the shallower the pool of people that could step in if I get hit by the proverbial bus.

If you have ideas, I'm all ears. Shoot me a PM.
 
timwinters said:
The current banners are okay but they give some here a reason to look down on others (something pilots excel at). It's happened before, albeit rarely, a statement is made that someone doesn't get to have an opinion because they have no banner.
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I think we can agree that, if that is happening, the banners are not the issue.
timwinters said:
LOL at my new banner! :cool:
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:D
 
Not so bad, then. Have you actually seen any value in GuardDuty? We've been fighting among ourselves about the value (or lack thereof) of trying to shim a traditional IPS in to the AWS network model, and GuardDuty would seem to provide some of that function, even though we can't use our own intelligence sources. Then again, being limited to what effectively looks like reputation-based lists (IP/domain) seems a bit low in the value-add department for the price.

[semi-coherent ramble]
My only thought for costs savings would be to investigate some of the purpose-built VPS hosts. AWS/Azure/etc just don't make financial sense when all you're doing is VPS/IaaS colocation. They absolutely shine when you're taking advantage of the P/SaaS options in conjunction with or replacing IaaS, though! The big disadvantage to the purpose VPS hosts is that it wouldn't be one-stop shopping anymore, leading to more complicated administration and maintenance of supporting and supported resources, fostering additional risk to the service, of course. Since I'm still a few pots of coffee away from fully functional this morning, I could probably convince myself back and forth on this one a few more times.
[/semi-coherent ramble]

P.S. I have no gripes with how you're doing it, more curious than anything. The site's never down when I bother to check in, and the community clearly feels the same since you can collect a couple of years worth of funding in a couple of months!
 
OK. Dumbass figured it out.
you're welcome.
50 bucks figures out to be .00168073 cents per post. :)
 
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