Cyberspace Communications finances for August 2004

Sep 7 21:50 UTC 2004

Here is the treasurer's report on Cyberspace Communications, Inc. finances 
through August 31st, 2004.

Beginning Balance     $3,580.31

Credits                 $150.00         Member contributions
                          $2.00         Payment for a Grex Handbook
                          $1.41         Interest on our savings account
                   ------------
                        $153.41

Debits                   $84.43         Pumpkin Rent for September
                         $61.02         Electricity for August
                         $91.54         Phone Bill
                        $135.00         DSL August 15 through September 15
                          $3.99         Paypal fees (income = $92)
                   ------------
                        $375.98

Ending Balance        $3,357.74

Our current balance breaks down as follows:

$3,101.20               General Fund
  $173.99               Silly Hat Fund
   $60.00               Spare Parts Fund
   $22.55               Infrastructure Fund

The money is distributed like this:

  $475.30   Checking account
$2,882.44   Savings account earning 0.55% interest annually

We had no new members in August.  We are currently at 73 members, 65 
of whom are paid through at least September 15th.  (The others expired 
recently and are in a grace period.)

Notes:

- I was away for most of August.  Thanks to gelinas for paying the 
bills.

- I moved $500 from the savings account to the checking account.

Thanks to everyone who contributed in August:

bookie, mooncat, n8rxs, witling, and one person who didn't give his 
login.

If you or your institution would like to become a member of Grex, it 
only costs $6/month or $60/year.  Send money to:

Cyberspace Communications
P. O. Box 4432
Ann Arbor, MI 48106-4432

If you pay by cash or money order, please include a photocopy of some 
form of ID.  I can't add you to the rolls without ID.  (If you pay 
with a personal check that has your name pre-printed on it, we 
consider that a good enough ID.)  Type !support or see 
http://www.cyberspace.org/member.html for more info.

response 2 of 80:

Sep 9 01:59 UTC 2004

Yes, we're not doing well, financially.  Becuse I was out of town for most
of August, I didn't send a lot of reminders I would have sent otherwise,
which accounts for some of the loss of income.  That should carry over to
September.  But even so, the membership numbers are lower than they've been
since 1994.

response 4 of 80:

Sep 9 21:32 UTC 2004

The "Personal favors for favored persons" vote didn't help any, either. 
Why the hell would a non-favored person donate to fund someone else's
personal playpen?

response 6 of 80:

Sep 10 16:50 UTC 2004

re #4
Even though there are some hobbyhorse hogs, I don't subscribe to the idea that
Grex is solely their property.  The vandalism of Jan Wolter's girlfriend was
unfortunate but I try not to let that rain on the idea that Grex is worth
saving from decay both administratively and hardware wise.

response 8 of 80:

Sep 10 17:17 UTC 2004

Maybe Cyberspace Inc should consider going colo in order to keep the
membership from being shut out and turned away.

response 10 of 80:

Sep 10 17:39 UTC 2004

What about colo on the host's hardware?

response 12 of 80:

Sep 10 18:20 UTC 2004

Regarding #9; Well, wait a sec; colo space providing vastly more than
grex needs was going to cost a lot more.  I suspect that colo supporting
just what we need to be significantly less expensive.

response 14 of 80:

Sep 10 20:07 UTC 2004

Or we could move the community to an forum-hosting entity, drop the 
hardware, drop our software, drop insurance and rental space and 
have no need for volunteer staff other than those fairwitnessing the 
conferences.  Of course we'd also be dropping dial-in capability and 
access to unix utilites and disk space.

Ultimately, I see this in Grex's future.

response 16 of 80:

Sep 10 20:38 UTC 2004

Re. 14:  Why are you a pessimist?

response 18 of 80:

Sep 10 22:23 UTC 2004

re #17
Ditto

response 20 of 80:

Sep 12 15:19 UTC 2004

I would have to disagree with Mary on the idea of turning Grex into 
just another web forum, with no unix access.   My observation from 
party is that the few new people we're getting came here originally
looking for a "free Unix shell."  A tiny percentage of those 
people are interested in community and communication, and that's where
the new users who stick around are coming from.  

response 24 of 80:

Sep 12 21:06 UTC 2004

(I have repeatedly offered to chip in!)