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-   -   What's special about being a PC supporter ? (https://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=295663)

Guy January 30th, 2013 2:38 PM

Truth be told, other than a few perks here and there, being a supporter isn't all that much special than being a regular member. It's all a matter of whether you wish to donate to the forum and if you have the money to do so. I donated back in 2009 mostly for the italic blue username and the perks if I'm honest, but giving back to the forum I spent so much time on felt good to do.

The money itself? Probably goes to maintaining the site's server and paying vBulletin fees. I never really paid attention to those set of specifics. You see, I try not to ask too many questions or else they might silence me.

I kid, I kid.

As for the tier system, it's there as an incentive and a good way to manage the amount of money people donate and place them accordingly.

Ivysaur January 30th, 2013 11:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Renpuu (Post 7510989)
Cirno just quoted me in order to be a tier 6 supporter you need to donate over 100 US dollars ? is this true ?

I mean why can't you just make a set price of like 10-20 USD and allow people to benefit from all these features or a monthly 1-3 USD subscription ?
I mean for the benefits of being a tier 2 supporter, you can just make a free blogs website and just link people to it O_o ?
Bigger avatars and access for being a tier 3 supporter ? What topics are even in a V.I.P section O_O ?

PM space and emails ? Big whoop ? I can't see how that can warrant more moneys when you can create a free email address straight away from google,yahoo,msn etc. ?

Abolishing tiers will stop this stupid "dick measuring" of who can give the most money,have the highest tier name and allow people of all budgets to afford and appreciate the features which come to being a PC supporter.

The problem is, people would donate $1 and get the same rewards as someone who had donated $100. The supporter list was full of people who had sent just pocket money once and expected the same rewards as someone who sent a two-digit donation or kept sending money month after month. It wasn't fair.

You know the humble bundle, how they ley you pay as little as you want to get X games but then there is a threshold you need to beat to get some other Y games, right? Well, it's not an e-penis contest, "ha-ha, I got Bastion and you only got Limbo!". It's just a reward for those who help more. That's it.

Donating is not an obligation. A regular member who has never donated can live exactly as well as one who did. Hell, we even give blogs for free to those who get over 5000 posts. And if you can only donate $1, we'll give you a supporter bar as a "thank you" for donating, even if you don't get the +700 PM space for people who donated $100.

Creating a one-size-fits-all tier of $20 (or whatever) will discourage people who can only donate $10 (or any other smaller account). Different tiers allow us to accept any donation and reward them accordingly. And hey, if you are donating $20, you can get to tier 5 just for an extra $5 next time you can send us some more money. Where is the problem?

Synerjee January 31st, 2013 12:09 AM

For me, donating is a sign of saying thank you to this site for making our everyday online life more exciting and meaningful and to show how much we love being a part of this huge family. The extra additions that you get are thank you gifts for supporting this site and helping to make it a better place. The donations, as far as I believe, go towards maintenance, and to pay for the hosting of this site. It is only fair to give back to what has given to us aren't I right? There is certainly no rivalry or competition just because one donates more than another. So far as I can see, everyone treats each other with equal respect. The tiers are to reward the generous giver with more generous gifts, as well as to sort donations and their donors into groups.

I would certainly love to donate, but I do not have free control of my money. My parents would certainly deny my request to donate their hard-earned money to a website that they have no concern about. If I had the chance and the permission to do so, I would gladly donate, because I know for sure that I Love PC. <3

Renpuu January 31st, 2013 7:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Went (Post 7517626)
The problem is, people would donate $1 and get the same rewards as someone who had donated $100. The supporter list was full of people who had sent just pocket money once and expected the same rewards as someone who sent a two-digit donation or kept sending money month after month. It wasn't fair.

You know the humble bundle, how they ley you pay as little as you want to get X games but then there is a threshold you need to beat to get some other Y games, right? Well, it's not an e-penis contest, "ha-ha, I got Bastion and you only got Limbo!". It's just a reward for those who help more. That's it.

Donating is not an obligation. A regular member who has never donated can live exactly as well as one who did. Hell, we even give blogs for free to those who get over 5000 posts. And if you can only donate $1, we'll give you a supporter bar as a "thank you" for donating, even if you don't get the +700 PM space for people who donated $100.

Creating a one-size-fits-all tier of $20 (or whatever) will discourage people who can only donate $10 (or any other smaller account). Different tiers allow us to accept any donation and reward them accordingly. And hey, if you are donating $20, you can get to tier 5 just for an extra $5 next time you can send us some more money. Where is the problem?

Okay so if you want to argue that $20 for tier 5 is not enough, how about $30-40 for tier 6 ?
Why should there be a super tier of supporter ? I mean if people want to give more money over time, than that's their choice, they're not doing it for more perks/features unless they want tier 6 status.
I've never given money to charity and been given a "title" for however much I wished to donate at that particular time.
I was implying that abolishing tiers would prevent and avoid "dick measuring."
I haven't personally seen any arguments over "who can donate more moneys" but having a section dedicated to ONLY supporters seems a bit odd in a forum which is meant to be public for all !
I'm sure we have all seen people argue about smaller things in life and I wouldn't be surprised in private conversations if people "big themselves up" for being a supporter.

If it was a straight donation of $30-40 for everything, would we see more members willing to donate to the forum rather than having a select few who are forced to shell out more money ?
If you want to see Pokecommunity as a business, would the business flourish from more donations of $30-40 with newer members appealing to these new features or wait for older members to shell out $100 each over time for tier 6 status.
Some may not even want to donate after tier 5 and be happy with that ?
So that's only $25 for a tier 5, when people could easily reach tier 6 for an additional set amount.
You could also allow other members to "gift" supporter status to other members (as long as they pay the set amount for it.)

If you guys wish to keep tiers, than that's your choice and I understand if you feel like it's an incentive to build up on.
But should we not make tier 6 more affordable to those who have already donated ?

We've all done it where we save some money for a particular purchase on goods or services. We could even have monthly bill payments of smaller amounts over time for those tight on budgets who could give $5-10 a month to achieve their supporter status.

I'm sure if people WANT to donate they will put money aside for that purpose.

Seth Rollins January 31st, 2013 7:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Renpuu (Post 7517936)
Okay so if you want to argue that $20 for tier 5 is not enough, how about $30-40 for tier 6 ?
Why should there be a super tier of supporter ? I mean if people want to give more money over time, than that's their choice, they're not doing it for more perks/features unless they want tier 6 status.
I've never given money to charity and been given a "title" for however much I wished to donate at that particular time.
I was implying that abolishing tiers would prevent and avoid "dick measuring."
I haven't personally seen any arguments over "who can donate more moneys" but having a section dedicated to ONLY supporters seems a bit odd in a forum which is meant to be public for all !
I'm sure we have all seen people argue about smaller things in life and I wouldn't be surprised in private conversations if people "big themselves up" for being a supporter.

If it was a straight donation of $30-40 for everything, would we see more members willing to donate to the forum rather than having a select few who are forced to shell out more money ?
If you want to see Pokecommunity as a business, would the business flourish from more donations of $30-40 with newer members appealing to these new features or wait for older members to shell out $100 each over time for tier 6 status.
Some may not even want to donate after tier 5 and be happy with that ?
So that's only $25 for a tier 5, when people could easily reach tier 6 for an additional set amount.
You could also allow other members to "gift" supporter status to other members (as long as they pay the set amount for it.)

If you guys wish to keep tiers, than that's your choice and I understand if you feel like it's an incentive to build up on.
But should we not make tier 6 more affordable to those who have already donated ?

We've all done it where we save some money for a particular purchase on goods or services. We could even have monthly bill payments of smaller amounts over time for those tight on budgets who could give $5-10 a month to achieve their supporter status.

I'm sure if people WANT to donate they will put money aside for that purpose.

Yeah, I don't know why we must donate 100$ dollars for tier 6...whatever, PC does what PC wants. What's the perk of tier 6???

Ivysaur January 31st, 2013 8:08 AM

Tier 6 was never supposed to exist. The top tier was 5, and then someone gave us $200, and some other people made it to 100 in several donations, and we were so impressed that we decided to create a special, super thank-you group for all of them, and we gave them a few last extra perks over the time. But that's it.

Why there must be a great tier of supporter? Because, unless we create a one-size-fits-all group (as I already argued about), then there must be a higher tier and at least one (or several) "lower" tiers. Why 100? Because we wanted to thank the people who had donated that much when there weren't any rewards for that, and it was a nice rounded number.

Why do perks even exist? Because we figured out that members would be more inclined to donate if we gave them something in turn. If you don't want any tier rewards, just tell us and we'll put you back in "regular members", we really don't mind. It's just that we don't mind giving people a few more centimetres of profile picture space in turn for them helping us maintain our sever. What's wrong with it?


Quote:

Some may not even want to donate after tier 5 and be happy with that ?
Such as myself. When I donated, my mod status gave me more perks than anything I could get by donating, but I nonetheless donated $25 just to help the forums. And, you know, any amount helps. Even if it's only $5, it's $5 less Steve has to pay for the server.

Quote:

So that's only $25 for a tier 5, when people could easily reach tier 6 for an additional set amount.
By that rationale, we could have 200 tiers, from $5 to $1000 or whatever. But this is not a bussiness, we aren't a subscription website. We offer rewards as a proof of our gratitude to those who can donate. If you can't donate more than $20 and you can only make it to tier 4, we aren't going to run to your house and call you "cheap" for not giving us $100. It's not "tier 6 or gtfo". It's give us anything you can and we'll be grateful for it.

Quote:

You could also allow other members to "gift" supporter status to other members (as long as they pay the set amount for it.)
This already exists.

Quote:

But should we not make tier 6 more affordable to those who have already donated ?
Tier 6 was supposed to be a special group for those who donated a surprisingly large amount of money. Lowering that thresold would make it lose its meaning. Or we would have to create a tier 7 for that purpose, meaning we'd be back to point 1.

Quote:

We've all done it where we save some money for a particular purchase on goods or services. We could even have monthly bill payments of smaller amounts over time for those tight on budgets who could give $5-10 a month to achieve their supporter status.
It's called recurrent supportership.

Shiny Celebi January 31st, 2013 12:40 PM

The perks are a "thank you for donating" Donating is certainly not required but is certainly a nice thing to do for the forums. Every little bit helps the forums, but you can help out without donating money as well by being a good user, being active, contributing to topics and helping other users and staff. I donated because I like PC and thought it would be a nice thing to do, of course perks are always nice too, and I enjoy those as well, but more I enjoy the feeling that I did a good thing to help and that they appreciate it.

Ben. January 31st, 2013 1:05 PM

Perks, everyone donates for the perks there is no way about it. Sure the odd person donated to support PC in the back of their. Why on earth would we have a donate in someone's name useless it wasn't about perks.
Also it's due to be noted that some people do get a bit too involved and donate because they think it's a prestigious symbol. It's not.

Seth Rollins January 31st, 2013 6:51 PM

Why do perks even exist? Perks exists to thank the members that donate. They MUST thank you for donating, right? That's why perks exists. I have a question for you...why you don't want perks to exist? That's good for members who donate...and they give you a reason for donating...

droomph January 31st, 2013 6:52 PM

I…um…

Honestly, it's good as it gets. If you can't donate, that's fine, but if we're making this a prestige contest, you have to realize that maybe you'll get a couple VMs saying "wow, supportership. huh" (on the off chance that some of your friends want their own blog or something) and a "yay blog!" comment somewhere, but it's really not a big deal to anyone. (trust me. it's not a big deal, as much as becoming mod and stuff.)

A much bigger "prestige contest" is just being around and present wherever. It's a lot more important to be known rather than donating.


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