It's Good To Be Back.......

The information on this site has saved me loads of money.

Pay a fee?

Happily yes.

I'm pretty certain the regulars here who were certainly concerned about this forum going
AWOL would all be happy to donate towards the running costs of the php server subscription.
The difficult issue would be the number of volunteering wallets and therefore each individual
££ outlay.

From the member list, whilst it looks very positive with over 1000 members, the reality is
that barely half of the top 50 regular posters are on this forum all the time and the fall
off to half a dozen posts every year is quite marked. I'm concerned with the way all the
current forums seem to be going with funding issues and figures of £20 for each being
discussed - this all starts becoming financially prohibitive.

One thing that has always been attractive about the many forums out here in netland is the
access to see what you're signing up to FIRST and if it's changed to a pay up to access the
members area etc it would deter some that lurk and gain insight/confidence to take the
plunge and buy an Xm etc.

It would be a crying shame if changes to keep the forum viable made it more cliquey and
unapproachable. This in fact is why I couldn't take to the Citroen Car Club where I was always
made to feel like an outsider and at the back of the que with any great deals/cars/parts etc
- something I feel many clubs are unintentionally guilty of doing and I did travel great distances
to the Annual/Autumn rallies too - my father dropped his yearly Sunbeam Alpine club after
20 odd years with the same disenchantment over the club organisers looking after themselves.
It was due to ever increasing membership fees too that saw my deciding to lapse my renewal
after 12 years in CCC.

Sad days? This rate, I'll have to start spending more time in the garage again...

Andrew

A couple of points. I seem to remember Chris Light saying the rights to this site are his and his alone. You know, copyright and all that.

When I had the Cinquecento I joined the club and paid £20 to go on the members section of the forum. Well to put it bluntly it wasn't worth 20p never mind 20 quid.

As to the first point there is an awful lot of info on here that will be lost if the forum goes. Might it not be a good idea for someone on here to act as a "librarian" and collect a database of members email addresses so that if ever the worst happens we could keep in touch and decide about funding our own forum?

Hosting a site does cost a few quid a month, if you're paying someone else to host it, but I believe in Chris' case, he runs kind of a hosting operation himself, and hosts several other sites for paying customers, so that being considered, Club-XM probably costs little / nothing extra, besides the cost of yearly renewal of domain names etc.

Cost can be prohibitive if you're paying just to host one site, but if you have an existing hosting infrastructre, then they are negibgible.

I host several sites for customers, to add another costs next to nothing now that everything is already in place.

That said, I like some of the other regulars who have posted, would be happy to stump up a few quid to meet any emerging costs.

Ciarán

Count me in too.

And Me Too it would be a shame to loose the site for the want of a little cash

Norman

Count me in too. Too valuable a resource to lose for the sake of a few squids.

Ken

This post has been edited by kenhall1202 on December 21, 2008 02:25 pm

I'm in, just give a name and I can send money thru paypal, skype or whatever.

Hi all.
In the last two years I've saved quite a bit of money by reading of other owners woe's and also with advice freely given by experienced members. I too would willingly pay towards the site by yearly subsciption.
And I really did get a fright when I couldn't get on to the forum last week, even E-mailed Peter in my panic!
Merry Christmas all.
Bob.

Thats a great idea

Another thing to think about, is if there is, say a £5-£10, subscription charge for current and new members, i hope that would not put off possible new members, it shouldn’t but it might.

I still think its worth doing, a lot of other forums have a charge. I know a few have a 'premium' section for paid up members. So normal users get to see the forum, but premium members get more storage in their inbox, the ability to delete their own posts and access to the premium members threads. Although this could be difficult to set up, and can cause arguments!

Whatever happens, we need to keep this forum going

For what it's worth, here are my thoughts based on what I've read here and on the BX forum:

We do not want a two-tier membership. It's our club.
Although Chris Light has never asked for funding, we are at his mercy if he decides to cut us adrift and maybe an offer of financial support might safeguard our position.
In these difficult financial times ( Thank you, "save the world" Gordon) there may be members who just cannot afford any contribution.
If we decide to go for compulsory members' contributions, non paying guests still have the ability to view our posts - they just can't put their fourpenn'orth in.
The members who only post very occasionaly may be put off by a mandatory subscription.

So what are our choices? They seem to be the following:

1. Carry on the way we are - me? I'm nervous, that was a wake up call.
2. Have a fixed membership fee - with our total membership, a pound a year should be ample. But counting only the active members, maybe a fiver.
3. Leave it to each individual member to decide if he wants to contribute and how much.

From what I've seen, Paypal may be convenient but they also cream off a large chunk of any money passing through them. We need a bank account number to pay into.

Chris? Noz? Where are you?

Derek

I don't like the idea of charging for someone to join, its put me off several, but then I am tight. I think any new members should be welcomes gratis. If they appreciate the forum as we do I am sure they would be more than happy to make a contribution, even if they don't, there are more than enough of us here to support it with minimal outlay.

Peter.N.

Hi all

Yep would be more than happy to pay, BUT, i do share Andmcit's concerns over attracting new members to the forum if it becomes unviewable to non members and new blood isnt flowing into the forum i fear it could stagnate or become too clicky.
Also i understand that Chris ownes the site, its contents, and anything to do with the club xm name, but arent we all jumping the gun a bit here? Chris did say dont worry! i understand the need to gauge peoples feelings on the matter just in case but i dont see any need to panic yet

D

Hi All

I have let this run so far but while I share the concerns it is mainly for continued access to the the data content of the site. I think Chris personally hosts this site as well as a number of other ones so I think we may be jumping the gun a bit on the costings.

There is a very good suggestion that has been made about a register of email contacts for use if the site should dissapear. When Club-xm went down last time I suddenly realised how few of the members I was able to contact so I would be willing to keep a list for those who want me to. I think our biggest risk is from the spam idiots evolving to a level of technology that disrupts the site content on a regular basis that then makes the back-up task beyond something we should expect of the moderators.

John

This post has been edited by xmexclusive on December 21, 2008 09:47 pm

I agree Dean, lets not get ahead of ourselves here. I'm sure if Chris did decide to let us go he would give us the nod first and not just turn the switch.

As I say if people are really worried let's save some email addresses.