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Updates below 24 May 2004 Scapers, Farscape Fantasy needs your help. The situation: In a nutshell: my job, going back to school, and building a new house is making it very difficult to maintain this site the way it should be. It had me considering closing the site by the end of the summer. Turns out Scapers have other ideas. There are basically two factors in play. First, I absolutely can no longer afford the time necessary to maintain the site properly, particularly updating new music videos. Keeping news updated and photos loaded is one thing, but daily updates are impossible. The other issue is money. My job pays decent money, and living in a cheap apartment all these years has allowed me to indulge in my passion for Farscape. But building a new house, being responsible, dealing with the mortgage, taxes, upkeep and other stuff I don't even know about yet, has changed my outlook and priorities. Spending $1500 a year for this web server is a commitment impossible to justify while knowing that I will soon be making weekly treks to Home Depot. Since posting a little blurb about my situation to the videos page, my thoughts about closing the site by the end of summer, I've gotten a number of emails from Scapers with suggestions and offers of help for the site, both administrative and financial. To be honest, asking for money is something I am not thrilled about. But Farscape Fantasy was built by hundreds of Scapers wanting to share their creative efforts. It's a unique site that promotes Farscape and generates interest in the show, and Scapers have a vested interest in the future of this site. In order to ensure the future of Farscape Fantasy, I've come up with a few solutions after taking some suggestions under consideration. The plan: Factor #1: Time People now post their fic and art to the site on their own, so why can't Scapers post their own videos? The new, automated video archive is currently in development, which if it works will completely change the dynamic of our video archive. If given the chance, I bet Scapers will post 50 - 60 new vids to this site every month. The archive will probably double its current size in six to eight months! If the technology is not a viable option, people whom I trust have volunteered to take over administrative duties, keeping the site alive. Personally, I prefer allowing Scapers to post their vids on their own, whenever they want. Factor #2: Money As long as Farscape Fantasy is running, it will always be free for anyone who wants to use it. A subscription or membership fee is completely out of the question. Based on suggestions and comments from Scapers and with some helpful advice from Jul over at WatchFarcape, who have dealt with trying to fund continued server resources themselves, we are holding a Farscape Fantasy server fund drive. The goal is to raise at least $1500, which will pay the annual server cost for this site for one year, plus pay for an upgraded server ASAP. The fundraiser will last two weeks, and I'll post updates daily. Scapers who wish to donate funds can do so by credit card to my PayPal account, or by personal check sent to the Farscape Fantasy PO box. In case we don't reach our goal, coming close is good enough. I will take care of the difference. If we exceed our goal, a judgment call will have to be made. Every $100 over our goal will keep the site up and running for another month. If we go way over our goal, I could close the fundraiser early and thank Scapers for securing this site's future. On the other hand, our expanding database could use a really fast (but expensive) server, so if the donations are made they won't go wasted. We'll see what happens. Lastly, and importantly, I am not associated with Farscape in any way. I have no connection to The Jim Henson Company, The Sci Fi Channel, The BBC or Hallmark Entertainment. Farscape Fantasy is not a business, a trust or any other kind of legal entity, so any donations made are monetary gifts given to me, David Maloof, AKA Dallascaper for the purpose of maintaining FarscapeFantasy.com. For more information on how to donate to help keep Farscape Fantasy running, see the panel on the right. If you have any questions, email me at Dallascaper@comcast.net If you would like to discuss this fundraiser with other Scapers, check out this thread [link] over at Kansas. Thank you for visiting this site, and long live Farscape! Dallascaper
Updated: 26 May 2004 Scapers were very generous yesterday, donating $550, or about 36% of our minimum goal. Thank you! Updated: 27 May 2004 Scapers,
we're up to $980 donated, or 65% of our goal. Thank you! Updated 28 May 2004 $1205.00, about 80% of our goal, donated as of 8 PM Friday, Dallas time. The $1205 is PayPal only; it doesn't include checks mailed to the PO box, which I haven't visited yet. Though I look forward to reaching our goal of $1500, Scapers have been successful in funding FF for an entire year. If we fall a little short, which I don't think will happen, I can make up the difference needed to upgrade the server. Thank you all! Updated 30 May 2004 Donations now total $1365, or 91% of our goal. We're almost there! Thank you. LithiumDoll writes: Just a note on the archiver - I'm integrating the videos into the fiction/gallery script and it's taking some crowbarring (two different user tables, it just ain't pretty) ... but it's doable for sure. Give me about another couple of days to burn some midnight oil and FF has a new archiver with self-upload vids, admin and moderator facilities and some new features all 'round in general. The only thing is that people will need to use FTP to upload. How to do that will hopefully written in a nice clear fashion, but ain't no way, no how, vids can be uploaded through the browser - servers tend to get twitchy about large files consuming all the resources on the way in. Go figure. Updated 2 June 2004 Official total as of 5 AM Wednesday: $1515 You did it! Thank you all!
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How to donate to the Farscape Fantasy server fund: Credit or Debit card through PayPal: It is not necessary for you to have a PayPal account to make a donation. All donations are welcome - there is no minimum. PayPal will automatically convert the following currency to US Dollars: Canadian Dollars, Euros, Pounds Sterling, and Yen Thank you for helping Farscape Fantasy! Sending
a personal check: David Maloof Send your donation to: Farscape
Fantasy My bank will convert all currency amounts to US Dollars. Thank you for helping Farscape Fantasy!
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