Need to provide a LOT of value for the money, if you are going to charge. To charge people to post will end up reducing traffic on here, and thus end up making this site less viable for ad revenue.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

I agree with both sides.

I think that charging to post on the boards is a foolish move, but I also see the merits in it.

And I think a happy medium can be found that everybody will be pleased with.

Solution? Perhaps we can figure out a "section" of the site that one must pay to use, or maybe one can be required to make a one-time payment to create threads, but you can post in any of them. Or maybe you have certain forums that can be used with "free" accounts, but others that can only be accessed via "members" accounts. Who knows? I don't necessarily mean any of these ideas as potential candidates for how we'd implement this concept; rather, I mean it as a way to inspire thought.

Some way in which one would still be able to interact but just not have all the site's features accessible, y'know. This would do a number of things.

One, it would keep the site relatively close to what we have at the current moment in time - this would keep interest high, and it would keep from driving away potential traffic.

Two, if utilized properly, it can do what gebx was saying - eliminating (a certain degree of) undesirable activity from the site. Paid members can rest assured that they'll find an area of the site in which they can escape (some of) the pesky trolls and incessant fanboys.

Three, it can become a method of income for the site. Not only would that make the site less of a stress for Brett, but it would also give him the opportunity to provide an even better service. And if he has funds to improve our services, he can make it even more worthwhile to become a paid member. He could even create a service requiring recurring payments. Who knows?


Lastly, a credit card would never be required. Paypal is a wonderful alternative that can be used on ANY website, so long as you have the Paypal plugin. And as long as you have a bank account, you can use Paypal.





Summarized: I don't like the idea gebx had, but he has the right concept down. If we work with it, it can mean wonders for the site.

thats an interesting idea. But im not sure if it would be a good idea though. It would be good deterrant for annoying members who have been permabanned but it would probably shrink this community more than its worth

NO!

Then be prepared to say bye bye to 98% of the community here :)

@ Bolded:

Why do you want to eliminate us?

No. Ask for donations if you want money. Demand money, and me and tons of other people are out of here. It's a good site, but not worth 5$.

I love how
- Eliminates most of the under 18 crowd
is considered a positive

VGChartz isn't worth 5 bucks!...wow...I paid for Boxofficemojo annual, and I spend FAR more time here than there!