Alara wrote:Well, after seeing a lot of the questions at hand, here's some answers of how I'd approach this...
Q: What to do with the money after the donation drive?
A: I think if we are within 33% striking distance of the cost for the "optimum" server, we should make another push a bit later, if not, the money should be put to use as the admin can agree on together.
Q: Who owns the money and hardware?
A: Some body of "all the current admin" is suggested, I don't know how that is feasible. If that would work, register a corporation, but I would place ownership with the CC - a group of members we trust and that are spread across the globe, and that stay steady. Still, someone would have to make the purchase in their name, unless we register a corp, which I'm really not all too familiar with.
Q: Who decides which modules are hosted, if we have X slots but more modules?
A: Apparently, this is a tough question. I would hope those who can host their modules themselves without unreasonable effort would do so, but then again, as ALFAns every DM team has in theory the same right to be hosted on our machines. Thus, if we can't find a mutual solution, it should be under the purview of the DMA, with veto power by lead as usual - that would make the most sense, as DMA has oversight over what servers get live status and so on.
Q: How to deal with the serverpark upkeep?
A: Apparently, we have no clue whether we have the willingness in ALFA to see if enough donations roll in every month to pay for the fees for hosting. This still should rely on individuals willing to fork out the amount of cash, and using money from the donation pool, if sufficient, is then used to compensate these members. If we see we get enough each month to easily pay, then we can pay directly over our common donation account.
That donations are anonymous, don't grant any rights and are not required at all goes without saying anyway, and seems to be what everyone managed to agree on.
Thank you!
+1000xp to Alara for a great post.
I agree with most of the things youre saying here. I know that we have a few members who are willing to cover the expenses for colocating atleast 1 server (around $80 / month). They want to, as many others, stay anonymous.
Obviously, we cant have any way of knowing how much money is possible to raise before trying. Should we end up with a sum below any target that is realistic, I agree that it is probably best to run another donations drive again at a later date.
I don't, like I said allready, expect anyone to have to deal with all the technical aspects of hosting. Isnt that why we have an Infra Admin and staff in the first place ? I think that as long as people know that what they are paying for is a better,- and most likely sorely needed in nwn2, system, that could be enough ?
Again, we dont seem to get too far on the issue on organizing the donations/bookeeping. CC is definately a valid possiblity though imo.
