Website and services sustainability. Would you donate?

[Moonchild]

As the title says. Would you donate to a drive to make all of our websites and services be sustainable and ad-free?

Since I've been looking for alternatives to keep things sustainable ever since Google put us in their cross-hairs for demonetization in the summer of last year, and seeing that our current alternatives are paying less and less due to more people blocking all ads everywhere™, something needs to be done.
Asking people to disable their adblocker on our websites is one thing but apparently my efforts trying to find a reasonable solution to ask people to do so is meeting with rather strong opposition, there's only one other way as long as we can't fully rely on donated computing power: a donation drive to repeat every year.

Before I start such a thing though, I'm asking you, our community members: would you donate? Would you want to? Do you have the possibility to do so?
Please vote in the poll.

[Octopuss]

Are we looking at one time donation or something recurring?
I already threw €10 in some time in past and I don't have a problem doing it again, but I don't think one time donations are going to cut it long term.

[rabnbeinn]

Asking people to disable their adblocker on our websites is one thing but apparently my efforts trying to find a reasonable solution to ask people to do so is meeting with rather strong opposition

A small price to pay for a great free browser

[LimboSlam]

Asking people to disable their adblocker on our websites is one thing but apparently my efforts trying to find a reasonable solution to ask people to do so is meeting with rather strong opposition

A small price to pay for a great free browser

I agree and totally support the ad-funding modal! Well, as long as they respect my privacy wishes.

Off-topic:
I think some people like to live in a world of ignorant bliss.

[dark_moon]

I would not disable my adblocker. Not because of i dont want to support, but because of security and privacy.
Also i donate in past for the Visual Studio program but dont have much money yet, so i cant donate for services

[CraigPD]

When choosing to contribute to something like the Pale Moon project I don't need to review profit and loss statements or detailed operating expense ledgers. I respect MC's ability to make sound economic decision in its ongoing operation.

Based on the utility value the software provides given the alternatives $25-45 in annual gratuities seems a reasonable price to pay personally. If 3% (probably far too optimistic) of the estimated 500k users acted similarly I expect the team can function adequately and keep things progressing as they have the past 4-5 years with a half M exclusive of search revenue and other ancillary sources I'm unaware of. Rather than a one-time commitment I prefer a pay as you go plan – quarterly or semi-annually – motivated by the incremental improvements and various bug fixes I experience over time.

I also have no problem white-listing this forum or the main site from ad-blocking. Only when paranoia runs deep would reasonable people utilizing this browser act otherwise given the exception request.

It's a shame Google has changed the playing field rules of engagement. Not unexpected at all given the aggregation of power they hold and brazenly exercise to their benefit with the passing years. Maybe anti-trust legislative initiatives will eventually restrain them if justice ever prevails, though I wouldn't wager a year's contribution on it. That would be a waste of money.

[rabnbeinn]

I also have no problem white-listing this forum or the main site from ad-blocking. Only when paranoia runs deep would reasonable people utilizing this browser act otherwise given the exception request.

"When paranoia runs deep". A fine choice of words.

[Cassette]

I personally don't mind the ads on the forum. They are small and don't interfere with my browsing experience. There was a short time period where I considered blocking them when they started redirecting me, but that was taken care of. I also donate a small amount each year just for using the browser. So my response is I allow the ads on the Pale Moon website and forum so I don't care to donate to keep it ad free, but I donate anyway.

[Terryphi]

It would be helpful to provide an estimate of the total funding required.

[Giraffe]

Although I don't have any ad-blockers apart from uBlock (and that's turned off for this site as I trust MC not to use nasty ad servers) I do have a big HOSTS file. Sometimes sites ask/tell me to disable adblocking but that would be difficult as I have no idea which entries are blocking ads on a site.
Now, there are two issues that concern me re. ads:
1). Time to load - often servers are overloaded and thus slow.
2). Far too many (>0) ad servers are infected with malware.

In addition, there are the relatively minor points of redirection and irrelevancy - on UK commercial TV the ads, on the rare occasions that I see any, of no interest whatsoever!

Now, if sites served ads 'in-house' from fast, clean servers, and the links were also clean, a lot more people would accept them as fair exchange for information/software - damn, I might even click on some as a matter of principle!

Sites that have ads and rely on them are their own worst enemies by trying to foist dangerous content onto their users.

BTW, I've recently made a small donation - first time ever! - and might do so again. Don't want PM going the same way as Cyberfox!

[Moonraker]

I dont mind ads and if it helps moonchild then thats fine.I dont like in your face pop ups.

[Isengrim]

Would you donate to a drive to make all of our websites and services be sustainable and ad-free?

Out of curiosity, is there a specific "preferred" or "suggested" donation amount?

[Moonchild]

Out of curiosity, is there a specific "preferred" or "suggested" donation amount?

I'm very well aware of people globally having completely different financial situations, so a "preferred" or "suggested" donation amount depends entirely on what you are able to give. If you want to balance it out for what you have, you can maybe decide on the amount by thinking about it this way: If this was any other (commercial) software product that you'd have to buy, what would you be comfortable with paying for it?

I hope this helps.

[Trippynet]

I've donated previously to the project, and would be willing to do so again. Alternatively, I would be happy to disable my ad-blocker so long as any ads are sensible. I have it disabled on a few other sites as well (such as GHacks). However when I tried disabling it some time back on The Inquirer, the result was so dreadful it immediately went back on again.

[TwoTankAmin]

Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising monetary contributions from a large number of people. (Not to be confused with a number of large people.)

I have supported Pale Moon by donating every year I have used the browser. I use ad blocking and tracking blocking software to the greatest extent possible. I prefer to leave these things on all the time and not to use white lists, so I donate to those organizations which are resources to me and to others and which are not primarily profit centers designed to make their owners a lot of money. (I never donated to Mozilla in all the years I used FF. I paid for IE with Windows.)

As noted, users of this browser range from folks who are struggling to make ends meet to folks like me who are able to donate more. So how much should users donate? One way to answer this question is to start by determining how many people, world-wide, use it. Numbers I have heard range from $500,000 to $1,000,000. Using those figures and US dollars (after all I am an American), here are some things to consider.

I every user donated $1/year that would result in between 1/2 and a million dollars a year. But it is unreasonable to expect every user would do this. So lets assume only one in 10 users will donate. They would each only need to donate a mere $10 year to produce the same result.

Let's be realistic here. If the wealthiest 10% of all Pale Moon users claim they are unable to afford $10/year, they are lying, plain and simple. If most of you are not donating this measly amount every year, stop using Pale Moon and go back to using one of the other browsers for the next month and see how much you enjoy that. If we the users do not donate, you do not deserve to have all the benefits this browser offers compared to the other options. Most of us use Pale Moon because of all the nasty stuff the other alternatives insist on forcing on users. Your data is theirs, what you see comes from them and they could care less about you.

To afford $10/year means giving up about 4 orders of fries at McDonalds, or having a a couple of fewer beers in a year. $10/year works out to less than 3 cents a day. Get a jar, drop 3 cents into it every day and once a year donate that.

People are going to pay Microsoft $49 not to have to use Edge and Bing, so what is it worth to you to have the freedom not to use IE, Chrome or Edge, to choose your search engine and have all the browser controls you want? What is it worth to you to still have extensions that continue to work? What is it worth to you to know your browser is not cleverly disguised spyware?


Which would you rather have each year $10 more to spend and no Pale Moon or $10 less to spend and having Pale Moon?


Here are some ideas/suggestions-

- Put up a page showing the goal for each year in terms of total donations. Then put up some nice graphic showing the current progress towards that goal. Post a budget outline of how donations will get allotted each year, i.e. the sort of things for which they pay. This should also include a section for ad generated revenue.

- Start a Pledge program. Users will pledge to donate a given amount for the year(at least $10. Maybe have categories- 10, 25, 50, 100 and over 100 one can sign up for. Without indicating the amount people pledged, post an alphabetical list of all the user names of those who have pledged. When they fulfill their pledge, put a gold star (or other icon of choice) next to their name. The reward is not for how much one pledges, rather it is for honoring their pledge.

- Also have a list the names of all the members who have donated at least $10 each year without having made a pledge or making a donation in addition to their pledge.

- Urge members to use the PayPal automatic monthly donation feature. (Is this economical for $1/month amounts? I see $2 min suggested but is that for one time donations or also for the monthly automatic ones?)

- Have a page which shows a summary of how the prior years donations were used. Let folks know what their donations bought.

The goal of the above is to motivate users to donate and never to shame those who do not.

[Moonraker]

I would gladly donate to palemoon regularly.
However this is my stance.
1.i havent got a clue "how to" donate,,no seriously i have not donated online before.
2.Being a sceptic,how do i know donations are going on what they say they are..?
Sorry thats not a dig at moonchild personally but in this day and age it seems commonplace,just look at the media involving charities etc and the money raised never goes to the chosen cause and appeal.

As i have said i would gladly donate regularly if it helps to keep this great browser running.

[adisib]

I would gladly donate to palemoon regularly.
However this is my stance.
1.i havent got a clue "how to" donate,,no seriously i have not donated online before.
2.Being a sceptic,how do i know donations are going on what they say they are..?
Sorry thats not a dig at moonchild personally but in this day and age it seems commonplace,just look at the media involving charities etc and the money raised never goes to the chosen cause and appeal.

As i have said i would gladly donate regularly if it helps to keep this great browser running.

This page shows how to donate, and includes a list of people who have.
http://www.palemoon.org/donations.shtml

[CharmCityCrab]

I had an idea to throw out there. It may not be a good one, but I thought I'd mention it just in case.

What about an annual "Kickstarter" style fundraising campaign or a PBS (An American television network funded partly by the government and partly by contributions from viewers) style fundraising drive? It wouldn't necessarily use a crowd source funding website like Kickstarter that would take a cut- it conceivably be all managed "in house"- but it could have similar characteristics.

The idea would be to on the one hand have prizes or gifts to people who pledge a certain amount of money, and on the other hand have extra things that the project itself will fund if various overall fundraising goals are met.

So, on the individual user side, it could be something like:

- Give $25, get an official adjustable blue baseball-style cap with the Pale Moon name and logo on it (Perhaps put the year on it was well, so you can have people contribute to the 2017 drive for the 2017 hat and to the 2018 drive for the 2018 hat). This would not only be a prize, it would also serve as advertising when people wear them out in public.

- Give $100, get the baseball cap, and a Pale Moon theme developer will develop your own custom theme for you based on your custom specifications, provided that it is "PG-rated", does not infringe on any copyrights, and that the alterations are reasonable (Some technical limitations might have to be included in the contest rules), and will maintain that theme to be compatible with upcoming version of Pale Moon for at least one calendar year (Hence prompting people to renew at the next pledge drive if possible). The person paying for it could get to decide if it was for their own personal use only under a joint proprietary license, or if they wanted Pale Moon to host it on the add-on site and make it available to the general public under an open-source license (If the latter, Pale Moon could decide to continue support for it even if the user does not renew his or her pledge, at it's own discretion based on how popular it is, or a user could fork it). Maybe someone like Lootyhoof could volunteer to do these.

-Give $100, and Pale Moon will create a PPA to maintain itself specifically for the Linux distro of your choice, and will make that available to all users of that distro (Maybe individual PPAs for more Linux distros could be a stretch goal instead, based on a total fundraising total).

You could limit such prizes to a certain number of people each (publishing the number in advance) and then when the number is filled, write "Sold out for this year". This probably would be with the understanding that if, say, the limit is 20 themes, and a total of 22 are bought before the page can be updated to say "sold out", that the project would be willing to honor the extra two. Ditto baseball hats and whatnot.

Stretch goals could be things like:

1. Raise x total dollars- Pale Moon and it's associated websites and add-ons will be able to stay in business.

2. Raise y total dollars- Pale Moon will hire a programmer to develop and maintain a Pale Moon for Android browser with certain key features (add-on support, etc.- whatever is specified by the project) and continue to maintain and develop it at least one full year (This could be an update of the existing Android Pale Moon browser, a new fork from an existing Android browser, or a "from scratch" new Pale Moon browser).

3. Raise z total dollars- Pale Moon will hire a developer(s) attempt to create an optional module that contains support for EME DRM that might operate as an extension or a separate version of the browser that supports this (Possibly with a caveat that if they can not do so, they will do something else instead) for those who want it that has the same branding and is only differentiated by the support for DRM.

To be honest, my one experience with Kickstarter was horrible, I'm just brainstorming. If MoonChild and the developers are interested in this idea, they could perhaps ask users want time of prizes and stretch goals they would like to see.

[CharmCityCrab]

Another thought would be to contact organizations like Apache, the Free Software Foundation, and so on and so forth to see if they are interested in supporting the project with developer time or money.

[CharmCityCrab]

How do other small browsers like Vivaldi support themselves on the financial side of things? Maybe there are some lessons to be learned there.