I am sure you have received the latest email saying this site will now be a pay site. This is how the internet will die. Government regulation and fees that keep increasing will surely destroy the free flow of information as it is designed to do. Will you pay a fee for this site? This fee will need to be paid with a traceable credit card payment that will be directly linked to this site and whatever company owns this site. You will now be financially directly linked to it. This site and its content will be traceable and linked directly back to you and your user name. Very dangerous! Will you actually do this?
Well, I did it twice and don't recall being tracked from any traces coming from this site. Yes, I plan on dong it a third time, even though Lush isn't perfect.
TRACKED!! Sounds like someone is into conspiracies. lol
If it becomes a ful paysite, I won't.
Tracked!!! Nonsense - as an author here I'm already linked to the site, far more than any payment will do - and even though I got a free Bronze membership for contributing, I plan to buy a Gold. It's a great site, and the fees are minimal.
It keeps breaking, they need to do something to generate income.
This from the same OP who has this idea that one should hoard silver and gold because the Federal Reserve isn't really part of the U.S. government, or something like this. Tracked? Seriously?
Yahhh....I would pay (already have) for the premium membership on this site, and would gladly pay four times over what I paid for my Gold membership.
Want to spend some time wallowing in a Recommended Read? Pick one! Or two! Or seven!
I've been on the internet for a long time, had websites.
Problem is, everyone wants media for free, and there is lots of free content on the internet (including R-rated and adult). It costs money and time to make the content. If it's not free, someone posts an illegal free copy for everyone to download.
So I completely understand the need for the webmasters to make money. Hosting and bandwidth costs money.
Will I pay. Not sure maybe, maybe not. It's entertainment for me, and not essential.
I write erotica. Would I submit a good story to negate or reduce the fees? Dunno if I want to or not. Maybe.
For stories, and poetry; there are rare ones which are good, most of it is low quality drivel voted up in popularity by a few social groups who interact. On the other end, I've seen really good stories which get few votes, just because the Author isn't in the "network."
So would I pay for stories? Um nope. There are better out there.
Answer right now = maybe, maybe not.
Those who think they are being tracked. That's silly. All the software on your computer and phone already has information transfer capability. All the memory cards SD cards and hard drives on your computer, have information which can easily be recovered, erased or not.
People that are worried can get pre paid cards. I work in adult entertainment myself and have a totally generic business name that shows up on clients credit card statements, and ones do use pre paid cards that are paranoid. Believe me, I understand the crippling costs of hosting a big site all too well. Many assume we webmasters are raking in the dough when in reality many times it's a victory to just break even. People want everything for free, they do not know, understand or even care in most cases if it's explained to them, they are enjoying a site on the owners dime. I sympathize and I get it, not many others do until you are in a similar situation yourselves.
No actually, I don't break even on my site, far from it, operating in the red until things take off. I'd say 80% of my running costs are out of my own pocket each and every month. Hundreds of dollars currently I pay monthly for my own hosting fees. You don't seem to grasp the costs of web hosting, whether or not the content is free, it costs a lot for the web owners to deliver it to you. And millions of people pay for everything from paid porn sites, around $19.99-$29.99 a MONTH, to ones that pay for phone sex. I take down clients credit card info every single day. I'd say less than 5% use pre paid cards to begin with. Most adult businesses have generic business names for just this reason. It's not your site, no one's asking you to pay. The conditions have been explained to you. You don't like them, no one's forcing you to pay. Simple as that.
Big-haired Bitch/Personality Hire
This has nothing to do with anything, but I'm just curious, Rob:
Are you a nudist by choice, or is it because of some big cotton or polyester conspiracy that you're not letting us in on?
The world needs to know.
░P░U░S░S░Y░ ░I░N░ ░B░I░O░
Anyone who thinks that they are not already linked and can be tracked is delusional.
Anyway, just to be clear, I used to run a plethora of websites, and fully support the idea of making money off of your hard work. With the amount of members here, this site should make money.
I think I decided that I am going to pay for the first bit and see how it goes. I certainly don't think the webmaster should be paying out of pocket to keep this site going. Maybe that's the way it goes these days though.
I don't think I will be paying for membership.
Correct me If I'm wrong but I think the features that I use the site for e.g. reading and scoring stories, posting in the forums and occasionally being in the chat rooms are available to free members. I don't write stories or visit the store so don't think a subscription is required.
I am fairly new to this site. I came here looking for a free chat site. I found something even better. It is a very nice site with nice people(for the most part) and it has the added feature of this forum. There are other aspects that this site has , I don't use very often though . As long as the chat rooms are free and I can come here and read the forums, for free, I will be happy. I agree with the people who say the stories are posted on here for free by their authors and should stay free, unless they are to start getting payed for their efforts.
Anyway I love this site and plan on using it in the future. If I am required to pay to use it, then that is a bridge I will cross at that time.
What I have gotten from Lush ...a new understanding of myself and others. And more important great friends,,,YES i will pay to keep the site open. Its only $10-50 a year. My friends here have made the site important.
I did. They deserve it. Why should we expect it all for free?
