May the giving hand never falter...

[greenskull]

I entered all donations and expences for this Mersenne Forum into a spreadsheet and then plotted the cumulative graphs:



- donations sum (green)
- expenditures sum (red)

Days = 40515 = 03 December 2010
Days = 44530 = 30 November 2021

When the red graph is above the green, it is a cash gap or deficit.
When the red graph is below the green one, it is a surplus balance.

I also built a separate graph of the budget balance - blue.



We see that the balance tends to be in deficit.
While spending remains constant (~$1 a day), donations are getting smaller and cash shortages are becoming more frequent and significant.

I think there will be more donations and more regular donations if the link to the donation page is available on each user's profile or at least explicitly somewhere on the forum homepage.
Since now finding a donation link is a whole quest:

[Dr Sardonicus]

Originally Posted by greenskull

<snip>
I think there will be more donations and more regular donations if the link to the donation page is available on each user's profile or at least explicitly somewhere on the forum homepage.
Since now finding a donation link is a whole quest:
<snip>

A quest leading to this post

[greenskull]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

A quest leading to this post

A forum user who wants to make a donation will try to search for something like - donation, support the forum, paypal, and so on.
Unfortunately, no such request answers the question of how to make a donation.
The link you gave does not contain any keywords. Hence, it is useless as a hint.

I found a hint in one of Kriesel's comments, who wrote that there is a tiny link to a donation site on the homepage.
I thought that apparently this link is some kind of microscopic dot.

[LaurV]

Originally Posted by greenskull

A forum user who really wants to make a donation will

... will pm Xyzzy, or other mod, s/he won't waste h[er|is] time in silly quests, and s/he will most probably keep quiet about it.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by LaurV

... will pm Xyzzy, or other mod, s/he won't waste h[er|is] time in silly quests, and s/he will most probably keep quiet about it.

You might very well say that. I couldn't possibly comment.

[greenskull]

Originally Posted by LaurV

... will pm Xyzzy, or other mod, s/he won't waste h[er|is] time in silly quests, and s/he will most probably keep quiet about it.

Originally Posted by xilman

You might very well say that. I couldn't possibly comment.

The more steps you need to take towards the goal, the fewer participants will reach it.
In other words, the longer the path to donate, the less donations will be.

Are you familiar with the concept of sales funnels and conversions in e-commerce?
It looks like no.

Donate is optional.
And if in order to do it someone need to look for something, write to someone, and then deal with it, then it's easier to just throw it out of their head and forget.

Those who really want to donate will probably spend some time for understanding how to do it.
And those who would like or, in principle, do not mind making a donation, if extra body movements are not needed for this, will be lost as a result.
These are exactly the same cash gaps that I showed on the graphs.

The main rule of the Internet is that a tool aimed at making money should be affordable and simple. Then there will be more money.

And I guess that PayPal is already an outdated solution. At least it should not be the only one. The giving hand must be given an additional choice.

I think it would be useful to provide a link to the stablecoin cryptocurrency account for donations.
USDT (the best choice), BUSD, TUSD, DAI, USDC, UST, ...
The rate of any dollar stablecoin to the dollar is 1:1.
The commission for the transfer does not exceed 1 dollar, regardless of the amount of transfers (if we use, say, the Tron (TRX) network).
Cash out cryptocurrency stablecoin is quick and easy. And it costs almost nothing, unlike the greedy PayPal.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by greenskull

And I guess that PayPal is already an outdated solution. At least it should not be the only one. The giving hand must be given an additional choice.

I send my donations in a lead lined box. It contains loose change. I send it postage due.

[xilman]

I hand over some used beer vouchers whenever Xyzzy drops by my place.

[LaurV]

Originally Posted by xilman

I hand over some used beer vouchers whenever Xyzzy drops by my place.

Next time when Xyzzy drops by your place please hand over some beer to me.