Donations and other important announcements.

ZizzyDizzyMC
Rampant Alicorn - The majestic steed of a blessed crusade (Masqueraded Esteem)
Fried Chicken - Attended an april fools event
Autist - How long until you notice this?  I noticed it after 4 days , but really I didn't even look till now.
Lil Shid Culture - If you see someone with a lil shid badge, you should refer to them by "Listen here you lil shid."
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained (The Bellstrike)

Administrator
Site Developer
Hello members of Ponybooru. Today I bring with me some mostly good news, albeit it’s not very timely. For the past 6 months the mod team has graciously helped this site here be the best it could be, even when things were tough. I wanted to start this post out saying how much I appreciate their support and effort despite myself not being in a position to reward them for their efforts currently. Please give a thank you to our staff, it means a lot to them and they really do like helping out. Especially the lil shids.
The first bit of news is a bit surprising and I’m kind of down about it, but I’ll have to go on with it anyway. Some of you will note that there was supposed to be a hardware transition between what we’re on now as a temp server from a friend to a server jointly owned by myself and CurtianedWizard. Due to unforseen life events, this has been held back indefinitely. I however am still determined to progress forward with Ponybooru.
So here comes the really important bit. I need to make a very sharp distinction that Ponybooru is **separate** from The Pony Archive in administration and policy. It is however far easier for me to run one company over two, which means TPA will be sharing finances with Ponybooru after a new server is in the datacenter. This unfortunately will not be the wonder server that was promised in the altbooru threads, again, due to unforeseen events. I did want to make the statement about shared finances very clear here though. This is because both sites, and more, are under my Z+ business branding. Now there really won’t be any changes to either site, or any other projects I currently maintain or will be maintaining. It just has to be said that I’m lazy and can’t afford the time to run everything separately.
So why are you here? Well, the real frank part here is that I already have *most* of a new server for Z+ built. I am lacking two crucial parts to the server, and after I have those parts we will be able to begin migration and *finally* update much of the code to a newer philomena version. So, you might ask what am I lacking? Well, I need 8 8TB hard drives and 128GB of DDR4 server memory. The hard drives I plan on purchasing used at a steep discount compared to new disks, these units do come with a year warranty and replacement for DOA’s. The ram is quite pricy, around $350 but it’s needed for this server for a couple of reasons. Been saving up to get each item as I can.
Gee, this sounds like an awful lot for a booru! You’d be correct, Ponybooru will not be the only site hosted by this server, as part of the Z+ network it will also be our stepping stone to actually being able to provide actual services such as user-managed VPS’s and high-bandwidth web-hosting. This new server was already planned to be a part of Z+’s network but I kept getting held up by financial stresses. It just happens to be that now it would be very nice to have. This would also make Z+, and by extension Ponybooru and TPA entirely self owned.
Will this raise monthly costs for the Z+ / TPA / PB network? Well initially no, not really. It’ll raise costs by about $5 - we’re recouping the costs of colocation by cutting all rented servers in our network. I’ve been cost cutting the past 6 months to make this possible as I understand hard financial times have hit most people with that damn virus. If we see lots of traffic, our colocation costs will go up a bit. This is however expected to only occur when Z+ has actual paying clients which will help to begin off-setting our costs. It is my goal to eventually have Z+ able to pay for itself rather than rely entirely on donations. It will be quite a while before that happens, but until then I am eternally grateful for any and all donations to the network.
For the first time I have added physical rewards to the tiers in the form of printed badges. Example image will be attached in a week or so. Donators also have the option to receive donator roles in both Ponybooru and Z+ discord servers. Additionally they have the option for a badge on ponybooru with higher tiers getting to pick from a large selection of donator badges or even choose their badge’s flavor text.
With this also comes a very small policy change. Ponybooru’s badge limit as set by policy will be 6 going forward. It would not be fair for those who already have 5 badges to have to give up one to get or display a donor badge.
Thank you again for your time, patience in reading, and your support of the pony fandom at large. Even if you don’t support us directly you can still go out and make content for the fandom, it’s highly encouraged. Spread some cheer and happiness. Ask someone how they’re doing or if you can do something to make them feel better.
 
The subscribestar is here: https://subscribestar.adult/theponyarchive  
|  
EDIT 1: If you subscribe please PM me using Subscribe Star’s messaging feature. Nothing is automatic at this time.
 
EDIT 2: Hey, an image example of the badges: full  
full  
full  
Initially it’ll be a limited pool of badges, but as things progress I fully expect some unique badges will arise. Eventually fully custom badges like the 2nd pic will be allowed provided you have the permissions to have the artwork printed for personal use (or are an artist of said work(s).)
 
The first and last badge’s are already in the pool of physical badge choices… PB badge design is made but is not yet printed.  
If you would like to design a badge you may contact me for exact sizing and color palette required.
 
Again, thank you for the support, and thanks for the staff making this possible.
Napsack
Rampant Stag - A swift sidekick
Rampant Squirrel - A ferocious friend
Fried Chicken - Attended an april fools event
Chatty Kirin - A user who has reached a combined 1000 forum posts or comments.
Donor | Pinkie Pie - Pie family best family
Liberty Belle -

Senior Moderator
Glare Mare
We’re here to support you if you need it. With some luck and generosity this’ll all work out. Or at least not crash and burn.
Officer Hotpants
Rabid Squirrel - Don't pet it.
A toast - Incredibly based
Officer Shid pants - Hi, Im a lil shid.
Chatty Kirin - A user who has reached a combined 1000 forum posts or comments.
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Moderator
Double-0 Negative
I noticed two or three days ago that Wizard had been dropped from the staff page and now had a System Administrator role. I was wondering what was up with that. Guess this more or less explains it.
TrukkinDuck
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
Fried Chicken - Attended an april fools event
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Nopan is best pants
I was expecting this to come up anyway, it was kind of needed and necessary. Anyway, just to be clear, none of those servers are EU based right? You’re transferring servers, but I’m not sure what will happen to the content there.
ArchiveAnon
Rampant Squirrel - A ferocious friend
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
Donor | Gabby - Best Birbcat, don't @ me
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained (unintended savior)

Senior Moderator
Everything Stays
@TrukkinDuck  
I’m not exactly knowledgeable about servers and such, but I cannot possibly imagine Zizzy hosting servers in the EU, no. Thing’s will almost certainly remain in the USA and continue to abide by the ‘pony related + legal is okay’ thing we’ve been going by. Content that is allowed currently will remain so as long as it remains legal basically.
runner2
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
Donor | Luna - THE LOVE HAS BEEN DOUBLED!
Artist -
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Libertatem Noctibus
@ZizzyDizzyMC  
Listen here you lil shid. I did notice those as I’m overly observant with random stuff.
 
Same issue here with me and Derpi from a while back… I refuse to use subscription type systems for donations but I wouldn’t mind directly throwing some money toward the site if possible.
 
Those physical badges look pretty neat as well and I would totally wear one behind my namebadge while I’m working if I had one. XD
runner2
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
Donor | Luna - THE LOVE HAS BEEN DOUBLED!
Artist -
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Libertatem Noctibus
@Acres
 
As part of the subscribestar thing or elsewhere? My main thing is that I would like one of the fancy donator badges but don’t wanna be forced to make an account on one of the subscription sites to do that.
 
I think Derpi was the same way on that and I simply refuse to do so.
FeatherTrap
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
Chatty Kirin - A user who has reached a combined 1000 forum posts or comments.
A toast - Incredibly based
Artist -
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Knight of Boops
I would love to pitch in and help, but my finances are in a skewy position at the moment. Until I get them sorted I dare not spend anything I might need.
 
Give me a few weeks to sort it out, if I’m able to stabilise everything then I’ll pledge.
ZizzyDizzyMC
Rampant Alicorn - The majestic steed of a blessed crusade (Masqueraded Esteem)
Fried Chicken - Attended an april fools event
Autist - How long until you notice this?  I noticed it after 4 days , but really I didn't even look till now.
Lil Shid Culture - If you see someone with a lil shid badge, you should refer to them by "Listen here you lil shid."
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained (The Bellstrike)

Administrator
Site Developer
@runner2  
Hey I’ve thought about it a bit.  
I wanted to explain my reasoning for preferring a subscription / ongoing thing over a 1 time or using a multi-payment system.
 
The main goal here is income stability, so I have a somewhat stable platform that I can make reasonable financial decisions with moving forward. A monthly site helps do this quite easily with little thought for users who wish to give.
 
My reasoning for choosing SubscribeStar is it’s ToS and it’s business practices. They’ve been a pleasure to work with on the support side of things as well.
 
Their fees are on a scale that is the transaction cost + % I plan on making a list of fee % as I calculate them.
 
I’m still thinking about other options for the future but am unsure atm. I do appreciate your willingness to help though, it means a lot.
 
Thank you to those who have subscribed already too!
Humble Oriathan
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
A toast - Incredibly based
Chatty Kirin - A user who has reached a combined 1000 forum posts or comments.
Fried Chicken - Attended an april fools event
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Wally Worshiper
I can’t pledge now, but in due time, you will have my financial support to. I like what we’ve created here, and I hope to see it outgrow derpibooru one day.
runner2
Boot badge - It's Bootiful
Donor | Luna - THE LOVE HAS BEEN DOUBLED!
Artist -
Liberty Belle - Sings the song of the unchained

Libertatem Noctibus
@ZizzyDizzyMC
 
I was originally expecting something like a Paypal donations thing when I first seen something about donations at all. That is generally what I have seen in the past whenever people/sites ask for donations is generally a donation through Paypal.
 
I don’t know about any sort of details regarding that method though so that might not be viable in this situation, but that is always an option. :)
 
If you do come up with something aside from subscription stuff that’s just a 1-off donation payment that doesn’t really require an account or anything (aside from Paypal since I do have that) then let me know. :D
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