realAbeFroman

I really like it here. I came here to interact with other people without the greedy exploitation and manipulation of huge companies that try to inject themselves into every aspect of users' lives just for the privilege of socializing online. The business model of every single large player in social media is disgusting and antisocial. This forum is perfect the way it is and interacting with any large corporation can't do anything positive, but can definitely contribute to ruining what you've got here. Thanks again for running this instance.

Nope, I'm brand new too. Enjoying it so far!

Welcome. Try the beans, they're really good here.

Hi fellow newb :) I don't want to speak for the owner of this site or any other users, but it could be that some people might be hesitant to suggest an amount so as not to make it seem like they're soliciting. I'm sure the person/people running this site are incurring costs for cloud computing resources and bandwidth as well as spending a lot of their own personal time for our benefit. I think the best approach for non-suggested donations is to give what you can afford and what you judge to be reasonable for the value you get out of it. For me, a site like this gives me a lot of value in terms of connection, entertainment, and just overall good to society, and I figured that's easily worth at least the same $10 a month I give to Amazon, though I just did $100 one-time instead of recurring monthly for now. At the end of the day I think the best approach is giving what you personally feel is appropriate and what you can afford and trusting that you're part of a community where everyone does their part and we all get to benefit together. I think that's the great part of this social media model. I love the idea of paying for a collective service that many people use instead of sacrificing my personal data to huge corporations just to take part in a public forum. If someone official tells you otherwise though, just ignore my idealistic bullsh*t :)