[geeks] ohno.mrbill.net / sunhelp might be going away

[gsm at mendelson.com]

On Wed, Oct 27, 2010 at 12:22:51PM -0500, Bill Bradford wrote:
>Now they want me to start paying full price.  Looks like it's going to be
>$158/month, for 1U of rack space and 1megabit sustained bandwidth.
>
>I've got until the end of November to figure out what I'm going to do.  Ads
>on SunHELP bring in approximately $30/month, but that only gets paid out
>every 3-4 months.

I'm sorry to say this, but I doubt that you will be able to get $158 a month
out of the members of this list and rescue. At one time it would not have
been a problem, but a lot of us are either unemployed or underemployed,
and many people have left these lists. 

They are no longer the 100-200 emails a day they were at their peak, and the
number of people on them is much smaller.

I still think they are useful and would like to support them, but I'm not
able to do much more than offer some ideas and a little bit of cash.

So here's the ideas:

1. Convert the lists to Yahoo lists. Annoying, but free.

2. Convert the lists to a commercial GMAIL account. $50 a year, I probably
    could spring for half a year, and someone else already volunteered the 
    other half ($30)

3. Move the website(s) to the amazon cloud. They have a one year free offer
    for a minimal system, it may do if there is no email. May not be permanent
    but it puts off the problem for a year. (insert old joke about the
    condemned man asking for a year to teach the king's horse to sing)

4. Several people who are on, or were on these lists are important people
    at large service companies. Maybe one of them can give you free email or
    web hosting.

5. Myspace (anyone remember them?) is trying to make a comeback. Maybe
    you could pitch them an idea on how to make it more "geek" friendly,
    with a sunhelp section as a pilot they can clone into more marketable
    and revenue producing things.

6. Close down shop and fade into internet history. With the traffic on these
    lists so low, and many of the geeks discussion being on FaceBook now,
    maybe it is a sign from above to move on. After all even Dave McGuire
    is on FaceBook.

Geoff.

-- 
Geoffrey S. Mendelson N3OWJ/4X1GM
To help restaurants, as part of the "stimulus package", everyone must order 
dessert. As part of the socialized health plan, you are forbidden to eat it. :-)