Guys, you may have seen from another post Thank you Chris that ChrisW The Boss is having trouble with ISP's as well as being between jobs.
The bottom line seems to be that without increased support this website could disappear.
So here's an IMPORTANT and URGENT appeal - if you want continued, freely given advice on anything from cars to domestic queries without the edge or back-biting on a lot of other sites think about donating.
If you already donate increase the amount.
If you are one of the lurkers or guests on here then maybe you should join fully and donate.
Most donate £10 for a whole year - maybe £20 should be the norm (students and OAP's excepted - well maybe not the later as I suspect there are a lot on here!) after all you'd probably spend that for one evening down the pub or out for one nosh so it's not a huge amount.
Just think about it - if this site went where would you go?
We'd all be like refugees - siteless, homeless and with no-where to go.
What I do know is that my build would have been a lot harder without this site and it continues to be a source of entertainment and advice.

So come on, put your hands in your pockets and press the Paypal button at the top of the page.

BTW before any-one thinks or suggests it I have no relation with ChrisW - financial or otherwise but really appreciate his efforts.

Cheers, Pewe10

I thoroughly appreciate this site, I mostly enjoy looking at peoples builds and Iv seeked a little advice, some of which has been answered but your suggesting 18000 members should pay £20 each? Does it really cost that much to run a website?

[Edited on 3/2/13 by maccmike]

have already increased donation

I hope i'm not going to end up paying for more flying lessons

quote:

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Originally posted by maccmike
I thoroughly appreciate this site, I mostly enjoy looking at peoples builds and Iv seeked a little advice, some of which has been answered but your suggesting 18000 members should pay £20 each? Does it really cost that much to run a website?

[Edited on 3/2/13 by maccmike]

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quote:

---

Originally posted by maccmike
I thoroughly appreciate this site, I mostly enjoy looking at peoples builds and Iv seeked a little advice, some of which has been answered but your suggesting 18000 members should pay £20 each? Does it really cost that much to run a website?

[Edited on 3/2/13 by maccmike]

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So your suggesting 18551 members at £20 a year that's some serious money ...

Anyway i do appreciate this site and personal donated the £10 and also i have bought a site t-shirt and if it came down to it id donate more but with the amount of members we have even £10 should be enough per year ?

I don't know how many of the 18551 members have paid even £10 but if there is an issue maybe giving the people who haven't donated a cap on the number of posts there allowed ect before donating like some other websites could be an idea ..

Because if you say £20 i bet most the people who have paid £10 will pay £20 and all the ones who never donated wont if that makes sense ..

I've not donated in a while, will chuck a tenner in next time I get paid.

I wonder if the manufacturers represented on the site might not find it beneficial to donate, certainly as far as I'm concerned LCB is first line support, rather than mk. Gotta be cheaper to keep this place going for a decade than paying a competent individual to sit by the phone answer all the questions that this place does.

Its a great site, I'm on it every day. Just made a donation, last one was about 5 yrs ago. Hopefully Chris will continue his good work.
SL8R

wonder how much revenue the advertisments bring in?

I have just deleted what I had replied as it will only provoke negative response. If the site needs more money then the site owner should ask, not just members who have nowt to do with the site's running costs.

Personally, I think this is the best kit car forum as it brings all makes and thoughts together. I subscribe to the WSCC annually and I wouldn't mind doing the same for this one. OK we don't receive a magazine so the costs would be lower but as has already been said, where would we be without this website.

I would quite happily pay £10.00 per year to use this site.

I donated again last night

I was planning to donate as I'm about to start my build and it seems like the right time to start helping, but I want the money to go to Chris rather than his ISP?

Is the current link 'safe', IE the money will go to the right place?

Top up donation done

quote:

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Originally posted by phelpsa

quote:

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Originally posted by maccmike
I thoroughly appreciate this site, I mostly enjoy looking at peoples builds and Iv seeked a little advice, some of which has been answered but your suggesting 18000 members should pay £20 each? Does it really cost that much to run a website?

[Edited on 3/2/13 by maccmike]

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There's only a couple of hundred regular users of the site. Chris estimates £200 a month in costs.

---

i use the site everyday and have paid when i registered. not been asked since.

if i get a formal request to fund then ill gladly do so.

quote:

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Originally posted by phelpsa

quote:

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Originally posted by maccmike
Does it really cost that much to run a website?
[Edited on 3/2/13 by maccmike]

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There's only a couple of hundred regular users of the site. Chris estimates £200 a month in costs.

---

I check the site atleast once daily and I would happily subscribe to a £2 a month scheme. If only 100 people signed up we could atleast cover the costs of the site.

As above though, I paid when I registered and I didn't realise it was a requirement to donate every year.

Don't get me wrong I will happily donate if we it means we don't loose the forum.

Best regards,

Chris

As above, I didn't relise the donations were so important.

I've just sent my money. I would hate to loose this forum. I use it every day. It's a great resource.

Cheers Chris.

Just donated my £20

first time I've donated for years but the site is fantastic so well worth it.

The easily £20 a year to be saved by having access to the for Sale items as soon as they appear!

Cheers,
James

Added my contribution. I thing this site is unique and invaluable to my build

Hi All

I spotted an influx of donations this morning so I thought someone must have put one of these threads up! Thank you to the OP

To answer a couple of things that have been raised...

First, and most important, there is absolutely no requirement to donate. It is entirely up to you. If you chose to give something, do so within your means and without detriment to yourself or your family. There is no minimum requirement and I won't tell anyone who has donated what - not even Fozzie knows! You'll get the '9 stars' whether you donate 1p or £1m.

Second, yes the donate button goes to me, once Paypal have taken their cut of course!

Third, if you don't want to donate money there are other ways you can help the site, and help encourage me to keep putting in the effort. Some ideas are towards the end of this post.

Some background:

The new hosting is costing around £200/month. The actual bill is about twice that, plus VAT, but I have a couple of my own things hosted too, including the 'live backup' system in a separate data centre in a different part of the country that has ensured we have not lost a single post despite all this disruption, so the £200 is a guess. I also laid out £300-odd in setup fees for the new hosting.

On top of that, this week I have shelled out £1000 on new server hardware after the old systems were stolen by the previous ISP. There is an ongoing legal case with regard to this so I can't say too much, but it's obvious that it will take some time to get the machines back and I wasn't going to leave the site down whilst this goes on so have made other arrangements.

One machine arrived late last week and I'm working on it now, and have been most of the weekend. There are something like 50GB of photos to move over and another couple of GB of database, so it's not a quick process. I expect to do the final move over later today.

The other one, which will handle mail, phones (including the verification), etc, I'm expecting tomorrow. Hopefully I'll get the bulk of the initial work done tomorrow and drive it over to the data centre either tomorrow evening or Tuesday morning. It will then probably be another day of work to get it up and running again, and then likely troubleshooting when you lot point out things I've missed.

Don't forget that I'd already migrated us once at the end of last week when the original systems were switched off. I needed a 'quick fix' whilst I made the rest of the arrangements. This is why the site has been a bit slow and some of the features haven't been working for the past 10 days or so. I preferred to have a limited version of the site up rather than total blackout! I had to pay for those temporary arrangements too.

So, taking a view of the last 10 days and the next couple, we're looking at something like £1600 paid out, about 30 hours work and 100 miles driven. In the last 24 hours I've had around £350 worth of donations after Paypal fees.

Yes, I make a bit on the adverts. Yes, I get a bit from the sponsors (Machine Mart and 2Gether Insurance). Yes, I get a few donations a month, but ultimately it's a labour of love, and I do it because I appreciate how many people enjoy using the site. I have never asked anyone for financial support and I have resisted the suggestions to put restrictions on those that chose not to pay. It is entirely up to you to donate if you wish. It always has been, and it always will be.

Ok, your efforts are more appreciated at the moment as I'm currently unemployed, but again it's entirely up to you. I'm not going to let something as minor as losing my job spoil a 12-year tradition!

So there we go... I don't think any of this will come as a surprise to the regular members, and I hope I've made it clear that nobody is under any obligation to contribute.

Some other things you can do that would show your appreciation:

- "Like" LocostBuilders on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/locostbuilders. Talk about the site in your status, tell people what you think. You can even add me as a friend if you like. All these things help create awareness in the site, cause people to visit, and subsequently the Google adverts to pay more. It's also a huge boost to my ego to see the hit rate rising!

- Pass any hosting, voip, network admin or general IT work my way, or at least let me quote for it and compare with what you are currently paying. Other than the last 10 days of events out of my control LB has been as close to 100% reliable as realistically possible over the last 10+ years. That should be a shining example of how well I can manage a hosting platform!

- Help raise awareness for the site in other ways, for example linking us from other forums. Posting links to adverts placed here in other forum's equivalents of 'Bargains Elsewhere' is an easy way of doing this.

- Talk about interesting topics on here. Don't worry if they are no locost related - we're all similar minded people and you are bound to find someone wanting to chat about most engineering related subjects, and occasionally about other stuff.

That's about it... aka I've waffled on long enough now! As always, you know where I am if you have any queries on the above.

Chris

added contrubution,

on here every day, great site, very helpfull,
know how much i value your opions/ thoughts, advise etc.
sorry, dont understand all the computer jargon, ( sounds like chris is here there and everywhere keeping this site running).
we must help keep this site running, where would we all go??

andy

Jesus, why is the hosting costing that much? I run a site similarly sized and populated (at one time) to this and it costs us £85 a year for unlimited bandwidth, storage space, email forwarding and database use!?

Sure it's not a dedicated server (I'm guessing it's a virtual server on a bank of hardware) but it's doing just fine. (Downtime that I'm aware of its about 6 minutes in the 4 years I've been running it)

[Edited on 3/2/13 by coyoteboy]

quote:

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Originally posted by coyoteboy
Jesus, why is the hosting costing that much? I run a site similarly sized and populated (at one time) to this and it costs us £85 a year for unlimited bandwidth, storage space, email forwarding and database use!?

Sure it's not a dedicated server (I'm guessing it's a virtual server on a bank of hardware) but it's doing just fine. (Downtime that I'm aware of its about 6 minutes in the 4 years I've been running it)

[Edited on 3/2/13 by coyoteboy]

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Surely it's not just a case of how much is the hosting cost, there's a huge amount of Chris' time and effort
involved. And time=money.

For the what I get out of this site I am more than happy to contribute, it's a tremendously useful place.
Also I've bought a few things recently of fellow members making my donation even more worth it.
Chris seem adamant that there will never be an obligatory contribution and I admire him for that.

quote:

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Originally posted by NigeEss
For the what I get out of this site I am more than happy to contribute, it's a tremendously useful place.
Also I've bought a few things recently of fellow members making my donation even more worth it.
Chris seem adamant that there will never be an obligatory contribution and I admire him for that.

---

I look at this site every day, donation sent, thanks again to all responsible for this site.

I also use this site everyday, and when it was down, it cost me nearly £200 on eBay because I didn't have anywhere else to go LOL

I have met some fabulous people, learnt alot of things, sold stuff and bought stuff...

So please accept my new donation being made as we speak!

Olz

Hi,
just wondered if youd considered moving to amazon ec2 chris?
this would surly reduce the cost as no hardware, we are currebtly using it extensivly in a corporate world with very high usage and data sortage and the costs are very low plus you can increase or decrease resauces as a you go, i can fully recomomend

quote:

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Originally posted by Pdlewis
Hi,
just wondered if youd considered moving to amazon ec2 chris?
this would surly reduce the cost as no hardware, we are currebtly using it extensivly in a corporate world with very high usage and data sortage and the costs are very low plus you can increase or decrease resauces as a you go, i can fully recomomend

---

Can you put a countdown on the hoe age from £200 a month in donations so people n see what is wing donated. I run a lot of other sites which have this to ensure that it keeps running cost covered.

Like this http://www.donationstracker.com/

I really appreciate the work you do on here.

Thanks

Rant away I'm just fascinated at seeing your increased costs for what is essentially a small target site for car enthusiasts (which is effectively what we were running) - they must scale massively non-linearly.

Indeed we're certainly lower bandwidth and drive space than LCB, though we were pushing 100GB transfer a month and 25GB drive space (subsequently dropped right off to around 10G). If you'd have said £80 a month I'd have been shocked but not entirely suprised, but more than double that seems like extortion unless you're running Amazon!

I work for a company that sells hosting space, if we sold 30 hours of a trained Microsoft engineers time to design, develop, upload and run a server this would run into many thousands.

Add then our charge for 2U's of rack space, Internet access via a firewall.......

£10 donated, which is an absolute bargain.

Cheers Chris

Regards Mark

[Edited on 3/2/13 by mark chandler]

quote:

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Originally posted by coyoteboy
...(which is effectively what we were running)...

---

No question about the value of this site as far as I am concerned!

Donation on the way!

I too was lost the other day without locostbuilders as there is no better place to hang out with a good tempered intelligent bunch of people from across the world.

Most are like minded, except for the BECers of course. They just don't understand...

quote:

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I don't think "WE" should take any credit for "running" this site. All that credit goes to Chris (and Fozzie). Sure, we all add content but little would change if any individual left; You can't say the same about Chris.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by ChrisW
Second, yes the donate button goes to me, once Paypal have taken their cut of course!

---

£10 top up donation willingly made - bargain.

Cheers!

quote:

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Originally posted by coyoteboy

quote:

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I don't think "WE" should take any credit for "running" this site. All that credit goes to Chris (and Fozzie). Sure, we all add content but little would change if any individual left; You can't say the same about Chris.

---

I think you mis-read my comment, I was discussing a similar site that "I" run and deal with the hosting for, for free, in my spare time etc etc


[Edited on 3/2/13 by coyoteboy]

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Chris,


I said it elsewhere last night, thank you...



There is a hardcore of regular users here, who will be more than willing to financially support the security of LCB, if push came to shove.

Being a complete idiot in the garage often ends up with me asking stupid questions, most of which get an answer here.


If you offered the option to donate automatically each month via paypal, I would be happy to sign up for this. The site encompasses the total kit car/home build market, there are no other sites doing this, that I would rely on.

The diversity of LCB is well known and well respected, there are some amazing engineering brains on here, and some great characters, WE all need this to keep going.....


Particularly Scootz, who would be forced to sell on the open market.....


Ivan

Donation completed.

Still a great site, I really must get out in my Tiger Supercat more

Ian

quote:

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Originally posted by T66


Particularly Scootz, who would be forced to sell on the open market.....


Ivan

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Come on LCB'ers... dig deep! I'll be getting divorced if continue to make losses hand-over-fist AND pay eBay fees!

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Dualist - 3/2/13 at 11:22 PM

I love the site and am on here everyday but can you please find an alternative to paypal and I would happily contribute, bank transfer perhaps.?

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T66 - 3/2/13 at 11:27 PM

quote:

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Originally posted by scootz

quote:

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Originally posted by T66


Particularly Scootz, who would be forced to sell on the open market.....


Ivan

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Come on LCB'ers... dig deep! I'll be getting divorced if continue to make losses hand-over-fist AND pay eBay fees!

---

Its good to see you have identified the key to your "parts pusher" status, a unique role on LCB of which you reign with absolute supremacy.


Long live the King.....

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scootz - 3/2/13 at 11:39 PM

And I've seen something shiny that I REALLY want, but don't have the readies to fund the purchase... so may look to move on some more bits n bobs soon (and maybe even the BMW bobber-bike project!).

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Irony - 4/2/13 at 12:56 AM

I don't think I would have tried to build a car if it wasn't for lcb. I don't think I could have done it at all without the friendly and helpful advice from members. Great bunch of people, great website. I would happily pay 10 quid a month to keep this site running. Donation sent.

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Dick Axtell - 4/2/13 at 09:58 AM

quote:

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Originally posted by ChrisW

quote:

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Originally posted by coyoteboy
Jesus, why is the hosting costing that much? I run a site similarly sized and populated (at one time) to this and it costs us £85 a year for unlimited bandwidth, storage space, email forwarding and database use!?
[Edited on 3/2/13 by coyoteboy]

---

quote:

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...and here lies the problem with the web hosting market today. Unlimited simply isn't possible. Everything costs money, the company are just taking a risk that you just put your personal website on it and not a site like this that chews through those resources. If you do, they'll simply void the contract under the acceptable use policy. I've been in the industry for 10 years so trust me on this one!

---

I had similar thoughts to coyoteboy, so your reply has clarified many of those points which were raised; thanks.

quote:

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If you've got a low volume site and are happy to sit on a server with 1000 other sites all competing for the resources, disk space, bandwidth, etc, then yes you can achieve a price point like that.

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Which is describes my site's present hosting, courtesy of www.hostpapa.co.uk. Clearly, the scale of the LCB operation is some orders of magnitude greater, as indicated by Chris' comment below..........

quote:

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We need this because we have something like 50GB of images, 1.5m unique posts, and generate around 100k page views per day.

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You mentioned backup!!! I'll have to check on this with my ISP - thanks for the reminder!!

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Not Anumber - 4/2/13 at 10:02 AM

This site provides a great service to the car building community. Top up donation paid. When you think what some people pay each month for magazines and / or club membership and how much more value this forum provides I think it's only right for people to expect to make a donation.

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RichardK - 4/2/13 at 11:45 AM

Bargain, cheers Chris

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minitici - 4/2/13 at 02:01 PM

Keep up the good work Chris - donation sent!

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AndyW - 4/2/13 at 02:52 PM

I'm wearing my LCB T shirt today, had 2 brickies and a formworker ask about the benefits. Told them to contibute to see benefits

Seriously, tho' great site which I am on daily. Keep up the good work and hope my donation helps

Andy

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RickRick - 4/2/13 at 04:21 PM

I'll chuck some more in at payday its been quite a bit since i donated now


is there anything we can all do to help lower the costs or speed up the site, i noticed 50gb mainly in pics, i know i've not got many in my achive, but if everybody went though there own pics and removed there unwanted pics what effect could that have? how about loosing some of the oldest posts, especialy bits like old forsales and the madhouse?

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ChrisW - 5/2/13 at 11:46 AM

Thank you to everyone that has put their hand in their pocket over the last few days. A fair old chunk of change has been donated which will at least cover the bills for a few months.

I hope you have all noticed how fast the site is running on the new server. _luke has done a sterling job helping me with the finer bits of tweaking, getting search working, etc. I'm very impressed with the performance boost that the new hardware has given, at least that's one positive thing to come out of all this hassle I've had.

Thanks again for all your support. I'm going back to fixing the mail server so we can get notifications back!

Chris

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AndyW - 5/2/13 at 02:44 PM

MESSAGE FOR CHRIS

Sometime when you click on a topic you get the page come up that says about how you opperate in your spare time etc etc,

I think that page still has the name of the old connectivity provider that you have parted company with?? Just a thought might be to change that text!!!

Hope that helps, if I got it wrong then soz!!!


Andy

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Daddylonglegs - 11/2/13 at 08:17 AM

As already said on this thread, the site has helped many 'not sures' to make their kit building dream a reality, me most definitely included. I have many people on here to thank for me making the Locost a reality.

I'm no mathematician and do not want to get into a running costs battle, but it's not just about money, I'm sure Chris has much of his free time used up by maintaining this site and I for one think he and his moderators do a sterling job.

Keep up the good work guys

Donation made.

John

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ChrisW - 11/2/13 at 09:35 AM

quote:

---

Originally posted by AndyW
MESSAGE FOR CHRIS

Sometime when you click on a topic you get the page come up that says about how you opperate in your spare time etc etc,

I think that page still has the name of the old connectivity provider that you have parted company with?? Just a thought might be to change that text!!!

Hope that helps, if I got it wrong then soz!!!


Andy

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Thanks Andy. I thought I had got rid of all of these so if you spot one please copy-paste the link in here.

Cheers, Chris

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Daddylonglegs - 11/2/13 at 10:29 AM

BTW Chris, I still cannot publish piccies in my archive?

JB

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rodgling - 11/2/13 at 10:31 AM

Donated. Also... any idea what's happened to my mug that I ordered Chris...?

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m4maverick - 24/2/13 at 02:56 PM

Hi
I don't post much as my experience and knowledge is limited but have learnt a hell of a lot on general information and technique, have also saved pounds on being able to search and validate the right bits to buy before making mistakes.

Right now am in hospital with prolapsed disc problem and had more than my previous donations worth of value just stopping me from going crazy. (You can only count the rivets on the ceiling so many times), so have just stuck another reasonable donation into Chris to show my appreciation.

Many Thanks
Mike

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craig1410 - 24/2/13 at 04:34 PM

Hi,

I don't use the site as much as I once did, mainly due to my Locost now being on the road, so I was blissfully unaware of the recent problems which Chris has had to deal with. As an IT professional myself I can certainly appreciate the effort Chris puts in to achieving the levels of performance and availability that the LB site delivers. £200pm can disappear very easily for a professionally hosted site, especially when you are looking for 99.999% availability (ie. just over 5 minutes per year of downtime)

Even though I don't use the site so much nowadays, I can't remember when I last donated so I've just donated again. I'm pretty sure I've had many times the value from this forum than any of the numerous books I've bought on the same subject. A typical Haynes manual is £17.99 I think and you can't ask it questions and it stays the same from the day you bought it until the day you loan it to someone and don't see it again...

Thanks Chris, I hope you get sorted out with a job soon. If not then seriously consider doing what I did in December 2011 and set yourself up as a consultant and go get some contracts. I've been lucky to have been continuously engaged for the last 14 months and just had my contract renewed for another 6 months on Friday. Give me a shout if you want to ask any questions about how to go about it.

Cheers,
Craig.

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inkafone - 24/2/13 at 05:00 PM

This is a very valuable source of info - donation sent

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alexpaul2 - 31/5/13 at 04:22 AM

I fully appreciate this website for all the member of this forum site.

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Not Anumber - 31/5/13 at 08:26 AM

Great site, great value. Donation topped up.

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theprisioner - 31/5/13 at 10:12 AM

Added another small contribution, please, please keep up the good work!

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FuryRebuild - 31/5/13 at 10:26 AM

quote:

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Originally posted by b14wrc
As above, I didn't relise the donations were so important.

I've just sent my money. I would hate to loose this forum. I use it every day. It's a great resource.

Cheers Chris.

---

Chris - I think this is the right way to go - I've used the site loads and really value the quality of information here.

I for one would welcome a £2 a month subscription, even if just to get access to the back of the shop.

Mark

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FuryRebuild - 31/5/13 at 10:33 AM

Right - I also didn't appreciate the donations may need to be more regular. I think £2 a month is great, so have chucked in £24. Can I get my status changed to "bloated plutocrat"?

Cheers
Mark

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loggyboy - 31/5/13 at 10:59 AM

quote:

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Originally posted by FuryRebuild
Right - I also didn't appreciate the donations may need to be more regular. I think £2 a month is great, so have chucked in £24. Can I get my status changed to "bloated plutocrat"?

Cheers
Mark

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As a contributer you can change your title in your profile. - IIRC

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lsdweb - 31/5/13 at 11:05 AM

Great site - invaluable resource (even though I'm not building at the moment!). Donatation made.

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FuryRebuild - 31/5/13 at 11:11 AM

quote:

---

Originally posted by loggyboy

quote:

---

Originally posted by FuryRebuild
Right - I also didn't appreciate the donations may need to be more regular. I think £2 a month is great, so have chucked in £24. Can I get my status changed to "bloated plutocrat"?

Cheers
Mark

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As a contributer you can change your title in your profile. - IIRC

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Eee by gum, so you can. And so I have.

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