Pulling a particular thread of conversation out...
Do you think it is right to publicly publicise who does and doesnt contribute financially towards THN?
What I would have an issue with is if the amounts that people were donating were published in some way, as I'd prefer that that info remained private.
The different amounts ARE published though - hence the difference between a supporter and a patron.
while there is still a *singular* value there, it doesn't bother me personally in the slightest.
As Huung says, he already contacted me and I'm glad my response was helpful to him. I'm cutting-pasting and rewriting some of my response to him in the hope that's more widely helpful too.
...
It's a tricky space. Introducing changes into a well established community is always difficult, not least when money is involved.
One of the risks of this kind of change is creating division in the community: the haves and the have-nots. In this case, I feel it's actually important to make some noise about contributing on an ongoing basis. THN costs a surprising amount to keep afloat and we want to be sure that we're not taking the support, financial or otherwise, for granted.
I've pulled some inspiration from the way
BoardGameGeek manage their much larger community in terms of giving back a simple thing in return for providing vital support. Their graphical stuff is more in an 8bit stylee, which isn't something I appreciate hugely. We've gone for
userbars, which is something we mooted for signatures about three years back but nothing came of it then. I guess this is the ultimate product of that thinking.
Talking pure theory for moment, you could draw a parallel with cookies, I guess. However, cookies and these rewards exist to serve a very different purpose. Cookies are a way of the community patting each other on the back for anything at all. I find they're often given for lols as much as "real" contributions. These are meant to, quite deliberately, act as marks of appreciation from the Admin Team.
See the core problem is this: we can't make people donate but if we don't then we will lose Promethius, permanently. This seems like a way to encourage support without kicking people for their monies, but also gives us a way of giving out other kinds of rewards too for competitions or other non-financial contributions.
Out of a portfolio of around 20ish awards, only two are financially related. I'd really hate for the awards to be lost in worries about "paying for banners" or fears of making second-class citizens of those who don't contribute financially to THN.
Why two? Counter question: how much financial support to THN is enough? Based on past performance, we're lucky to have 10 subscribers plus a further 5 one-off donators (not counting raffles, as offering "cash" prizes for contributions is very different). These people cover the majority of the hard costs that keep THN running. We simply can't do everything we do without them and I honestly feel we can't thank them enough.
So what about the other people who just give a little bit? They're awesome too. Are they the same as the former set? Personally, I don't think so. Why? It's the difference between £2.50/year and £120/year (or more). So we draw a line. It's arbitrary, yes, but £20 seems like enough to make a difference
by itself. Lots of £2.50's add up, of course, but practically we don't get the 50 or so
per month we need to keep THN running into the future.
So, we want to reward the people who've made a big difference. Seems natural. But we also want to thank those who've given what they could. They're different sorts of people and it seems worthy that the former should be lauded and the latter should be thanked. Maybe it's the difference between "thank you very much" and merely "thank you"? Still, that's the difference and why they've been divided.
Will there be some other financial award? I doubt it, unless perhaps someone paid for all of THN for an entire year or something. I'd make them a special badge in a heartbeat. Would they get anything else for their contribution? Nope (which, I guess, discourages that sort of massive contribution...), unless you count being thanked a lot.
It's a difficult space. This was the best we could come up with in terms of thanking and recognising people without going crazy.
Whatever the case, if people would rather not show their title then they are welcome to request all or part of it be removed; it won't change their entitlement to it, of course, just a matter of whether they want to show it or not.
