First of all, let me thank again those of you who have helped support SDA with your private donations by mail in the past few months.
Until today, my attempts to set up a functioning PayPal account had been tangled up in a catch-22 of red tape over an old, misaddressed account. After over 4 hours of work online, followed up by calls to their help center, backed up by a few choice expletives ... the problem was finally rectified and a new account established. I've added a "donations" button on the sidebar for your convenience. The form it generates is self-explanatory.
Other blog notes:
Re: the problems in commenting last week. It turned out to be a combination of spam attacks - plus our usual traffic! The hosting company has moved SDA to a new, upgraded server in an effort to relieve those problems. (We were causing load issues for other sites as well). So far, things appear to be better. But if you do encounter your attempts to post "hanging" or generating an error page, just sit tight - it's due to the server being under heavy demand. The comment has probably gone through just fine.
If you've any other questions, or concerns, drop them in the comments.
PayPal is about as evil as the Big 5 Banks combined, plus a little dishonesty thrown in for good measure. Yet, just like the Big 5, it's hard to conduct business without getting involved with them to some degree. To this point though I've warded off the dreaded "premium account" and kept my more suitable "personal account" for buying only.
Done.
Ditto.
Excellent.
Come on boys and girls, it is time to ante up.
I bet the libs are offended by tip jars too.
Ditto and done.
Pay Pal works just fine, used it many times.
Now lets see .. sda replaces,.. no supersedes, .. no obliterates Macleans, G&M($898.56), cable($360.00, Scientifc American, WP, (CP), (AP), (Reuters), National Post, Torstar, that adds up to about $3155.29 per year. Saves all those $$$s And besides they are bad for one's Mental Health.
I will first have to transfer some money over, Kate.
...ah dontcha love paperwerk?
"I bet the libs are offended by tip jars too."
Excellent joke - I laughed.
PayPal's fine, customer service is as good or better than average. I have a premium account (and a personal account) and it works for me.
Afterthought, a minority, but a significant one, of people don't like PayPal... you should get an "Amazon" donation button as well. Besides, marketing studies show the more options, the more transactions.
Now if only we can get you off of Movable Type...
Thankyou, everyone. I'm a bit overwhelmed at how many donations have come in.
I will say that Paypal's customer service has improved. When I tried to fix this about a year ago, I hit a brick wall. This time I was able to get a real person, and explain the problem. It still took a few days, and a few more dead ends, but they finally allowed common sense to take hold and just fix it.
That's encouraging news... that they are improving. Granted that's the only direction they could have moved in without going to jail.
I didn't know it was possible to have a personal AND premium account, I may look into that one day instead of spoiling the personal account I have used. So far they've never frozen my funds, but Kate, be sure to get that money out of your account and into a bank ASAP if you really want to use it.
its the top notch restaurant syndrome, a rave revue brings the customers in droves and .... quality of service plummets.
fortunately on the internet, service capacity is SCALABLE. which Kate now reports has been done.
bravo Katharine. you are an important source for 2nd opinion.
paypal was the single most difficult outfit for me to find a live person. now I have all 20 +/- of my p/w's on a printout !!!
p.s. what is the avg donation? what would you think necessary/suitable/nice to have ???
is 30 bucks an insult or too much ?? clue me in here.
Hint; sda is saving us $$Hundreds$$ every year in subsciptions alone. Not to mention the mental decay in reading/watching the MSM. Only one take, the left one, on the news there. They are all in it together. At sda there are hundreds of sources/takes on the news. Not a stretch at all.
If the USSR would have had the Internet and Blogs, the Berlin Wall would have never come down. It would have never went UP !!
Kate,
Have you considered adding a couple of PayPal subscription buttons? I contribute to a couple of open source projects like that ... nothing for me to remember.
qwerty:
Whatever you can afford or think it's worth, mang/mangette. It's really like any other donation in that respect. I'd love to give a billion a year to the Sally Ann and my local SPCA, but I can't do that. I can do something, however.
Besides, this isn't a contest, and no-one's asking you to reveal how much you gave.
B Hoax Aware says: "Hint; sda is saving us $$Hundreds$$ every year in subsciptions alone"
Me No Dhimmi says: And think of the saved psychotherapy fees!!! The good mental health derived from learning that you're not totally alone in your conservative/libertarian thinking.
I second Ural's request.
I'm all ready with my credit card, but need some help--I am an online/tech/computer Dummy, believe me--on how to do this online.
1. Do I have to sign up with Pay Pal? I figure I do, but need to know for sure.
2. In the window that says Payment For, do I have to put Donation, or do I just leave it blank?
3. In the window that says Price, do I need to put the amount of my donation?
4. Do I have to fill in the windows for the Billing Address, as nothing is being sent because I'm just making a donation?
I'm sorry to be so "duh" when it comes to this, but I don't buy anything online and need someone to take me by the hand and walk me through the whole process.
Thanks. I'm sure someone will take pity on me, and tell me what I need to do to get a donation to Kate. In another post, I said I'd be first in line. So much for promises. But at least I want to be in line.
Kate! Your cheque is in the mail. HaHa. No...HONEST.
"Me No Dhimmi says: And think of the saved psychotherapy fees!!!"
MeNo, if your doctor told you that you needed psychotherapy, please don't substitute their prescription with SDA. Please?
[Just pulling your leg ;-)]
Done.
BATB,
1. Do I have to sign up with Pay Pal? I figure I do, but need to know for sure.
I think you do - I know US based accounts (I assume Kate went Canada) do not.
2. In the window that says Payment For, do I have to put Donation, or do I just leave it blank?
Whatever - it just shows up on your CC statement as what you put in.
3. In the window that says Price, do I need to put the amount of my donation?
Yes.
4. Do I have to fill in the windows for the Billing Address, as nothing is being sent because I'm just making a donation?
Put in "no address required ... or whatever means the same thing" The reason is that Kate may (or may not) have to take an action if you input an address.
BATB, if you prefer, just email me and I'll send you my mailing address.
Thanks, Kate. That's what I'll do.
Thanks, ural, for your help. As a sometime editor, I need P-R-E-C-I-S-E instructions, otherwise I'm sunk. 'Self-confessed computer/online dummy... :-(
...great to see people putting money where they keyboard is...
;-)
...great to see people putting money where their keyboard is...
;-)
dang! guess means i have to send another cheque for the double post...