Our site goes down from time to time but we usually resolve it within an hour.  This time it was 12 hours. Sorry for any inconvenience, frustration, sadness, or depression that you dealt with as a result.  It lasted so long this time because was our amazing volunteer server admin was away from the computer.

 

It gives me a chance to be frank with you.  I hate doing fundraisers, as I want to believe that this site can be sustained on ad/amazon/subscriber revenue.  Many a months, it can.  RRS costs a few hundred dollars per month to operate and right now, we're not quite making that back.  Actually one of our awesome board members recently sent us our largest single donation of the year and it got us to about even.  

Another reason I haven't made a public request for donations in over 2 years is that I feel I let you down on the last public appeal for money to buy a server.  I assure you we got a new server to upgrade our sites to the next era of web utilization.  I am sorry I can't enjoy it's spoils with you quite yet.  I don't want to throw anyone under the bus, but for the most part it's delay was beyond my control.  I could have avoided it if I had 10-15k to spend on professional help. I don't work off a budget that large, we're dealing in hundreds here. 

In the 24 months since we've owned the server, it has done some work for us and been online, it hosts some things, sometimes.  We have practice sites, but it's daddy's are very busy with real life work.  From Feb-Sept I have about 8 hours a week I can spend on RRS, I work multiple jobs and still make less than 30k/yr.  My earning potential is lower now as a result of my life as an atheist activist.  I'm also a single dad of a young man about to head to college.  Right now he needs me quite a bit.  He has me in the gym with him for about 12 hours a week. I'm worried about how I'm going to afford his college.  He'll have over a 4.0 GPA but I'll still have to cover big costs over the next few years.  For example he doesn't have a car.  It's a decent life, very fulfilling, just not very financially rewarding.  

Right now things are tight.  I feel like we can go in two general directions from here...

DOWN: The site continues on a trend where I have to come out of pocket to keep it going.  It feels more cost effective to reduce or scale back in some way then to keep it thriving.  This might allow me to put the last remaining batch of my focus on a real life job.

UP: We actually have enough money to get the help we need to make our site have the cutting edge community site technology and speed we need to compete in the domain of ideas.  We become dominant again.  Everyone who has ever posted here has their views amplified in the domain of internet ideas.

I don't mean to startle you, I am fairly certain we're not going anywhere.  Freudien slip... we probably are just going to be stagnant, no up, no down.  

There are certainly tons of awesome people that care and that contribute.  Thanks to anyone that has ever donated, it's because of you that RationalResponders.com is still here.  But I've had these thoughts for a while, and thought some of you might want to know what kind of financial state RRS/I'm in.  

This site and it's donors are responsible for supporting CelebAtheists.com and Atheism United.  

We could use your help. If you would like to help point us towards "UP" please consider a one time donation.  Go big, it's a one time donation.  

You can also make a $3, $10, $25 monthly donation.

If you do decide to donate, allow me to say thanks right now.  I really appreciate it. 

If you're wealthy and you're asking yourself, "how much would it take to fix all of this and revolutionize these sites?"  The answer is $25,000 will do it.