Donations (community input encouraged)
The donations block needs work. :)
At the moment, we don't have any actual PayPal integration, which means that each donation has to be entered manually by me, and then I have to update the donations block. This is fine, but it's prone to error (math errors, missing donation notifications from paypal, me being off on vacation or something and not being around to update the Donations block at an appropriate time).
Here's what I'd like to do with it:
- Figure out how to record donations automatically so the donations block can be updated in realtime, without any intervention on my part.
- Update the "Donation record" page in realtime as well
- Remove the "How was it used?" field from the Donation Record. At this point, if I commission two works at the same time, who's to say which donation was spent on commission A and which was spent on commission B? That said, where the money is spent is still important, so I'm going to...
- Add an Expenditure Record page that tracks money spent on commissions, server maintenance, etc.
- Automatically award a "Site Supporter" medal to donors
- I'm considering the possibility of holding "donation drives", where I price a large commission ($1000+) from an artist and then buy the commission once we reach that amount. In these cases, people can specify whether they want their donation to be for the donation drive or for our normal commissions.
I've mentioned this in the past, but it bears repeating: At no point will donations ever give anyone special access to the site. All donations will always be spent on commissions, unless someone specifically asks they be used to cover server costs. This won't change with OGA 2.0.
Anyway, if you have any thoughts, please post them here. Be aware, though, that exchanging money tends to be a delicate topic, so I need to be very conservative in terms of how donations are dealt with, even if it means decereasing the overall amount that we bring in.
Bart
Hi Bart,
Good initiative. While I am not in a position to help OGA financially as of right now, here are few things that come to my mind. See if it helps you.This is again taken from http://flossexperiences.wordpress.com/2010/07/22/gaming-v/
"Also feel free to to make also donations on the site as (from the developer’s own statements he would be using it exclusively to commission art exclusively. He has also made clear the issues I have seen on many such sites (No automation of donation in real-time and lack of accountability on where the money is spent.) A related issue is how to know how much money/price is good for a work of art. He should possibly describe a work of art and ask people to submit a sort of open tender for the same. There should be a way where people can see which artists are going or putting up these works. Maybe we come to know of artists which we didn’t know before. Things such as previous experience of donating or works being commissioned by bart, previous quality of work etc., adhering to timelines and all should all be in the open and make it a more transparent site. This lack of transparency is also what bogs major projects. For e.g. look at wikipedia’s yearly budgets. They tell as much as they hide. There is a need of real-time accounting systems but that’s a different tale altogether." - shirish
Again just my 2 paise.
Hmm what about flattr integration:
http://flattr.com/
Might even be also cool for individual assets, but then linking the flattr button back to the original author (e.g. make an option when submitting art if the flattr button should be displayed)
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http://freegamedev.net
Can you get me a beta key? :)
nope :(
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http://freegamedev.net
You can request a beta key here: Add me to the beta invite list
Invitation only...old marketing trick to have you want it more.
However they want you to pay/donate some bucks a month before you can get donations.
>Invitation only...old marketing trick to have you want it more.
Crazy idea (not to be seriously listened to): hype up a secret invitation-only part of OGA2.0 (“with content you have never seen before!”), but when people get to it, it turns out to be just an empty page.
@Robin:
I'm sure that would go over well. :)
The trick is making membership so exclusive and secret that everyone thinks *some* people have it, but in reality none do. Thus no one would ever see the empty page ;).