In the plans for 2016 I wrote:
Ask for help with running costs
A good friend asked if anyone had ever offered to help with the running costs. I said yes, but that I'd politely refused. My friend tells me I'm stupid!
So, as the site gets bigger and costs rise, I'll ask if any regular visitors to Gwulo would like to make a small contribution to help with the running costs. I haven't decided how to do this yet, but Patreon looks like it could help.
I've set up a Patreon page, but before I send it out to newsletter subscribers, I want to ask Gwulo's regular readers and contributors (that's you!) two questions first:
1. If you have any strong feelings that this is a step in the wrong direction, please let me know. The last thing I want to do is turn away the people who've given so much to the site.
2. Please could you let me know if anything on the Patreon page is confusing, or you have any other questions about it. I'd like it to be as clear as possible when I send it out to the larger audience.
Please reply in the comments below, or by email if you prefer. Thank you for your help, and special thanks to patron #1, who has helped a lot with setting this up.
Here's Gwulo's page on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/gwulo
Regards,
David
A personal opinion
I, for one, would like to say that David's request for financial contributions to secure Gwulo's future is a necessary and even overdue step.
I came across Gwulo in 2010. As far as I can tell, David monitors the site every day, seeks out information to contributors' questions, even making expeditions on foot to do so, screens the site from hostile attacks and is constantly creating new features - all this for no financial reward and with no days off.
The IT costs for keeping Gwulo going are quite a factor, but far greater is the value of David's time. The acclaim and awards that David has received for Gwulo's contribution to uncovering the history of Hong Kong are very nice and well deserved, but don't put food on the table. I hope he won't mind if I suggest that we contributors who enjoy reading the daily Gwulo posts and who may have come across information that is useful to us personally, try to scrape together a "contributors' salary" for David, that he is far too modest to ask for himself.
If a fair number of us can get together a fighting fund for Gwulo, by pledging small regular subscriptions through Patreon, I hope we can postpone the day when David might regretfully have to announce that he is having to close Gwulo down. It's a valuable and successful site, in which many people have had a hand, but its very success is going to require more and more management time.
Sorry if I'm speaking out of turn, David.
Jill
Hi Jill, thanks for your
Hi Jill, thanks for your support and encouragement. The feedback I've received has been positive, so I'll post a notice about this to the front page on the weekend, and it will also go out to newsletter subscribers.
Regards, David