Dear friends,
As I mentioned yesterday, I have come to the conclusion that I need to share with you the problems which I and my blog are having and, frankly, to ask for your help. I have been trying to avoid this, but several good friends have strongly urged me to do so and time has proven that they were right.
First, I will begin by a short “state of the community” mini-report so we can all see how far we have got and where we all are now.
Since 2007 this blog has been a “one-man show” where one anonymous dude shared his thoughts with an abstract (and very small but also very nice) Internet audience. The war in the Ukraine changed all that. From a blog which almost never even mentioned the Ukraine (I was focused mostly on the Middle-East) the Saker Blog rapidly became a 99% Ukraine-centered blog. Along with that, an explosion in the number of readers happened: while for years I had maybe a couple of hundred visitors (on a good day), this spring it went from hundreds, to thousands, to tens of thousands to the absolute record of just under 70’000 in one day in August. Then, it slowly tapered off back to a more reasonable 20’000-30’000 per day, depending on the events in the Ukraine: the worse the war, the more readers I got (-: which made me feel like a “war profiteer” :-). The second huge change which suddenly happened was the the small community around this blog suddenly massively grew in size. It all began when a wonderful French lady (“C” – encore merci pour tout!!) wrote to tell me that she thought my blog should be translated into French. I replied “great – but I cannot do it myself”. She said that she would try to find somebody.
A few months later there are now six, soon to be seven (Latin American is almost ready!), independent Saker blogs – all tremendously successful, all with their own large readership and attached YouTube channels.
Then there are the guest-author’s SITREPS: Ukraine, Iraq, Nigeria, Transcarpathia Transnistria and Gagauzia, and Latin America. Two of them come directly from a war zone and thus depend on the author’s personal safety and access to communications. All of them provide an insider look which is simply not to be found elsewhere. I consider these SITREPs a fantastic asset to our community.
Furthermore, there are two more recent developments which I am delighted with and which deserve special mention here: Alexander Mercouris has agreed to post his (always excellent) FB commentaries on this blog and I am now a regular contributor to Russia Insider with whom the Saker community can now also collaborate on various issues. In other words, our community is rapidly growing. And what all this means is this:
We are making a real difference. We have established a presence in a record time and the future prospects look nothing short of fantastic. Furthermore, in this current war the information aspect is at least as important as bullets and guns. In fact, the Empire spends a lot more on information warfare then on the military hardware actually used. In other words, while a diverse community of like-minded people like ours has neither the goal or the means to beat the big heavyweights like the AngloZionist media or special services, we are big enough to make a difference and they cannot completely ignore us. At the very least, we can serve to crash their propaganda about a consensus in their support. Finally, we can be a people-to-people bridge between the people living under the AngloZionist Empire’s rule and the those living in the (truly) “free world” lead by Russia.
I still have to pinch myself from time to time to check whether this is ” really real”, or this is just a dream (the regular contact I have with the wonderful people working on the other Saker blogs and that I now consider as friends, proves to me that, yes, this is real).
Finally, because of the very high risks of censorship and/or legal attack, I have agreed to move this blog to a new server in a safe(r) jurisdiction (Iceland) and on a privately owned server. As you know, this important and necessary step has, so far, been less than a success (More about that further below) So let’s turn to my problems now.
They can all be summarized in a simple expression: time and money.
The huge growth of this blog and the other independent Saker blogs and of our (now truly worldwide) community did not just happen “like that”. At each step of the way, I had to find the right people, discuss an immense array of issues and, of course, make mistakes and try to learn from them. I had to cope with at least one major crisis which took a lot of energy to mediate and resolve and I had to deal with a lot of people who promised much but delivered nothing. I am not complaining about this, but I want you to understand that it all entails a huge number of hours of work to organize and fix. All the while while producing analyses of the civil war in the Ukraine and moderating one to several hundred comments each day (I had asked two friends to help me with that task, but one concluded that the philosophy of this blog did not make him feel comfortable while the second one simply dumped me with less than a week’s notice).
As a result of all these developments, my daily workload for this blog has been exponentially going up throughout the spring, summer and fall. At the same time, however, donations have been going down. So let’s talk about these donations (sigh, deep breath, plunging).
Those who have been here long enough know that the entire idea of donations came from readers who literally demanded that I create some kind of donation option. I have to tell you that I have always been extremely uncomfortable and embarrassed taking about money (even writing this makes me feel absolutely terrible) but that I decided to give it try. To my most absolute amazement, donations began coming in and even in amounts sufficient enough to make a difference in my family’s budget. In fact, without these donations we could not have made it through the summer without sinking further into debt (full disclosure: we have a house and 2 old cars, but no savings, no pension, and plenty of credit card debt). Over the past couple of months, however, these donations have been steadily decreasing and, frankly, my family and I only pulled it through thanks to one individual from northern Europe who has been helping month after month and without whom I could never have maintained this blog. Clearly, many supporters are suffering from “donor fatigue” or are also maxed out.
From the beginning of the existence of this blog I always have been reluctant to create categories of readers or to offer some products/services only to paying subscribers. This is still something I don’t want to do. Still, I am told by friends that I should consider such an option. In practical terms, we are talking about the possibility of writing a book about Russia based on some of the articles I have posted here and/or making a podcast. Right now, I have way too much to do just to keep things running, but I could consider these options in the future, especially if my financial situation continues to deteriorate. At this point in time, however, I cannot add any further activities or ventures to what I have to do every day, not unless I find a way to squeeze 36-48 hours of life into a 24 hour day. Worse, if I have to take on these ventures just to make ends meet, I will have to dramatically decrease the time spent on this blog and this, right at the time when the Empire’s war against Russia is heating up and the Ukraine is about to explode again. This makes no sense to me.
By the way, I am often accused of being a “paid Putin agent”. Every time I read that I sigh in think “if only that was true…”. The reality is that Vladimir Vladimirovich has not contributed a single kopek to this blog (yet?), nor has any other Russian government, corporate or even private entity. A few Russian readers have, but I can count them on the fingers of one hand. Considering the absolutely dismal Russian performance in the current PR war against the western MSM propaganda machine, I am at loss for words to describe this apparent indifference. I can only surmise that this the “not without honor, except in your own country, and in your own house” phenomenon at work.
If I had a magic wand, I would go back to doing what I think I do best and what most of you would probably want me to do: write analyses for this blog. But in order to do that, I need to be honest with you and admit to you that I hit a kind of a “wall” and that I need your help. If you value what you get on this blog then please help me work for this blog in conditions where I can at least preserve my mental health and focus on my writing rather than on my ballooning debt. I am sorry to be so blunt about this, but at this point I have no other choice.
Then there is the issue of the new blog.
Fundamentally, I think that the decision to move the blog to Iceland is a sound one. Furthermore, I personally like the new blog a lot, both the design, the visual appearance and the work on it as an author and administrator. Simply put: WordPress is infinitely better than Blogger. Furthermore, there is a real risk of being shut down here, on Blogger. So I see no reasons to question the original idea. The implementation is, however, a different business. Here I personally responsible for a number of mistakes. I will spare you all the technical details, but the bottom line is that for the time being the new blog needs to go back into testing and until it is fixed we all have to only use this blog here, on Blogger, for the foreseeable future. The new blog will be back and, hopefully, the next time around it will be more solid than the first one. But for the time being – Blogger is the only option.
The bottom line is this: I need your help.
First, if you have not contributed to this blog in the past, please do. Right now less than 0.25% of the readers of this blog have sent a donation. If you have, please consider contributing again or even increasing your contribution.
Second, please let me know what you think of the idea of creating “for purchase” products as opposed to keep everything for free. Specifically, please let me know if you would be interested in purchasing a book and/or a podcast. My own preference goes for the former, but you might think otherwise.
Third, do you have any ideas about fund-raising/crowd-funding? Are there any amongst you who are knowledgeable about this realm about which I know nothing? Would any of you offer your time as a volunteer fund-raiser of some type? What about this idea: can the community support my work by raising funds for me not by sending donations, but literally by creating some kind of fund-raising mechanism? Seeking out donors amongst friends? Organizing some kind of mailing list or dedicated website? Write to Vladimir Vladimirovich and ask for his help (just kidding!)? Seriously, if you cannot donate or are maxed out – can you help with your brain and, especially, your time?
In other words, while advice about what I could/should do is great, it would be even greater if some of you could actually take it upon themselves to help directly. Right now, I am so overworked that I stopped writing my thesis, stopped all my recreational activities and my daily reading is down to 15min a day max: I have 3 books in the pipeline to review for this blog, and I had only enough time to read 3/4 of the first one…
Fourth, please forgive me all the problems with the new server and the back and fourth between the old and new one. For the time being, let’s stay here and if suddenly I get shut down by Blogger – then go to any of the other Saker blogs (which are all safely hosted in Iceland) until the new blog is fixed.
Fifth and last, but most definitely not least – do you have any other suggestions or ideas? I really hope that this appeal to the community will generate one (or several) solutions. So far, what I call the “spontaneous self-organization of people” has been nothing short of miraculous for me and since the friend I mentioned yesterday did write “We can fix everything except you” I have decided to honestly lay out in front of “all of y’alls” (as they say in Florida) the stuff I am struggling with and which destroys my peace of mind.
Right now, I have the feeling that I am swimming against a Tsunami and I am losing the strength to do so very fast. Please think about it all and if you can help, in any form, please do.
I would prefer if you posted your reactions/ideas/suggestions here, but feel free to also email me if you prefer. I will probably not have the time to respond individually to most (or even any) of your comments/emails, but I will try as best I can. And I will definitely read every single with the greatest attention.
For the rest of the week, I will probably post less as I will be working on many of these behind-the-scenes problems, but since I left you with two *truly* world-class articles to consider (Strelkov’s reply to Khodorkovsky and the Glaziev – Khazin press conference) and since the “questions to Khazin” are still being collected until Friday, I trust that this is fair enough. Of course, in case of critical developments I will set everything aside and keep you posted as best I can.
Okay, readers and friends, your turn now. Please help in any way you can.
Thanks and kind regards to all,
The Saker
Dear Saker,
I am truly sorry and mortified that I can’t help you.My financial status is equal to yours…..So I cannot contribute financially to anything which is extremely frustrating.However,because of the idea of stealing of your time without being able to contribute to your resistance( because that is exactly what you are doing,resisting against the Empire)I will from now on not contribute to the comments.But I shall continue to read you as long as it is possible.
If you publish a book ,I will gladly buy it and start to put money aside for this purpose.
I could help to moderate the comments if
a/you show me how to do it,being quite illiterate computer wise
b/You give me a bunch of let say 40 comments to moderate by this I mean I could share the work with another person and when I take a responsibility I will perform it that is a promise.
BCH
First of all, thank you for all your work. You and this community have strengthened my beliefs sometimes, challenged those sometimes and open new windows in other times. I have learned to think more globally, look more locally and step back to view the bigger picture.
Not being a blogger, I thought that this effort was just a simple thing. Write your observations, get feedback, put your feet up and relax. I regret the casual way that I didn’t recognize the immense amount of work all of you have put into this effort to help me grow into a bigger human.
If you would consider a podcast, that would be great.
In the meantime, I will send you what I can.
With heartfilled thanks.
First – everyone asks for money, and they all have to have fund drives periodically. You’ll get more used to it although you’ll never like it. I worry about your tax situation, I hope you have some good advice on that.
Second – I have believed all along that you must get rid of the comment moderation task. This must cost you an enormous amount of time, and it cuts down on your ability to post your own content.
Therefore the comments moderation issue must be solved. Either allow comments to post un-moderated, and delete the junk in hindsight or, better, recruit a team of moderators here – and I have a feeling some of our commenters here would be happy to help weed the chaff out.
Even with a team, you may still want to let comments appear in real time. Have a set of rules for commenting, and ruthlessly delete comments that break the rules, and never apologize or explain.
To make this work you may – or may not – have to insist that people make up a user name. Most of us are anonymous here, including you and me, but we have names. That’s not much to ask if it helps the moderation and the discussion – which it does, enormously, and without any loss of privacy.
I’m sure you’ll get this same advice from many people.
A podcast would be a great idea. You could charge 3 dollars or so for each listener the way that Egalite Reconciliation has started doing for Soral’s own videos.
It might also save time as it is usually faster to express ideas orally than it is to craft the written words.
Have you considered running Adsense Ads on the website?
@Anonymous:Have you considered running Adsense Ads on the website?
I have such a hatred for commercial advertisement that I will never do that. I understand the rationale for doing it, I don’t condemn those who think or do otherwise, but I will never do that myself. Over my dead body, sorry :-(
Kind regards,
The Saker
Community service is tough work with hardly any gains. I see many of the sites that used to report on the AZ problems are now not updated much. So everyone is burnt out.
What you should probably do is farm out more rips to do instead of writing new articles every day. Reading books and stuff takes a huge amount of time.
I know there are political blogs which can sustain themselves on donations but they cater specifically to places like the US political scene. Its only those less fortunate losers who go to sites like this one because we have more free time and maybe have seen the damage caused by unbridled exceptionialism. The main problem here might be a whole bunch of us wont pack much of a punch.
I have first hand experience in this. Those well off do not really care about the less fortunate and even if they are knowledgeable they do not want to rock the boat.
Which leaves us with? well scrapping the bottom of the barrel here.. We might have good intentions but on the reality global scale of things, we are scrapping the bottom in most all areas.
I suppose it comes down to this, your health is more important than anything else. If things look too hot, turn down the heat. What you are doing is important. But you got to keep things in context. The blog will continue slowly. You got to do what you got to do to survive. You cant expect the blog to take care of you. That might end up disappointing everyone. You should not let the blog dictate your life. The sudden inrush of people looking at your words will give you a feeling of power and godliness but thats fleeting.
Maybe people should post less comments to moderate. We should after all use a forum for interactions than doing it here.
Oh one thing you could do is create a shadow blog. Use the same template as this one and people go there to read new stuff and post comments. While this current blog remains as it is. You just forward people there so you dont have to worry about losing control of the original blog. Find a few people who will help and select someone to do a few tasks on it. Only 1 person at a time. If they dont work out try another person and on and on. The first post here will redirect to the shadow blog while the main blog remains frozen. Once every few weeks you could update the main blog to stay current but other wise it is not updated. What ever happen to the shadow blog, you can just create another one and redirect to that new one. It would be a safer way to do something here which was never ment to be done.
“I have such a hatred for commercial advertisement that I will never do that.”
Have you considered advertising relevant books – like AsiaTimes is doing?
I would buy quenelle t-shirt (can’t find e-shop in english) and Saint George Ribbon (look on ebay, sells for ridiculous price).
Donated yesterday. Btw much bigger donation ($100) went to auslander. He wrote he will go public when it ends, but I don’t see any end anytime soon. I hope it was used as promised.
Antiwar.com collects 100k every 3 months. How do they do that? May be you should inquire.
I have thought of contributing but since I hate Paypal and Amazon, I’ve been putting it off. I will now force myself to send you something for all of the information I have learned here. Because of the way you were talking, I think we all believed you were getting lots of donations and were okay in that regard.
Also, how about VKontakte or other Russian sites? You could try to get some funding that way. Or, do some crazy thing and contact Abramovich or someone like that who could see the usefulness of your endeavour.
Lastly, try to find some products that you approve of and who can advertise here and bypass google.
You know, I always found it odd how the Russians, even when they live in the West, isolate themselves.
Anyway, good luck.
Dear The Saker,
In regard to crowd funding these are the top ten sites and you will see the number one site has low costs and anyone can set up.
http://crowdfunding.com/
I have seen another well known blogger raise a lot of money using crowd funding.
I am not very good at IT stuff though happy to ask friends who are or could help with crowd funding.
I personally would be happy to pay a monthly subscription to read your site. You could charge $5/10 a month and this would help to pay for everything.
The more subscribers you have the less the monthly subscription. This would give a regular income for your site and give you time to focus and work.
Regards,
Veritas
Money I
Dear Saker:
Thank you for letting your blog community know of the true state of affairs.
Our alternative sources of information are so precious—I am always surprised that Tom Feeley, at ICH (on which I and I am sure many others have relied for years, has such a hard time getting people who read his emails with links to the ICH website every day to send him any money. The hard reality is that most people will not help.
Grieved said that everyone has to ask for money, and hates it, and this is sadly true.That is why it is a good idea to try to get some regularity into this, so that a certain amount of money is coming in every month. ICH uses PayPal, which I hate. So I send a check on a fairly regular basis. But I donate to the ACLU (an org. I consider highly worthy of financial support) with a regular $10 donation every month, charged to my credit card. It is not a lot, but it is regular. I would do this for ICH if they offered the option and have repeatedly suggested this to Feeley, but never had a response! Perhaps this is complicated to arrange, for example, with one’s bank. That I do not know. I would certainly try to find out. The advantage is that donors don’t have to go through a mental decision=making process whenever they see appeals for money. It is already taken care of.
Can you quantify the bottom line of how much you need per month? Quantifying and stating how close you are to reaching a goal is a good way for potential donors to visualize their help. Teh more specific you are, the better. Example: I need $1,000/month. That would mean 100 signups @ $10/month. So if seventy have signed on, you (or your fundraiser) can say: OK, we need 30 more @10/month. Next day: Now we need just 25. My experience with a very successful online petition relating to an issue in my hometown showed just how satisfying this can be: like watching a stock ticker that just goes up! People were turning to it constantly throughout the day to see the number of signatories go up (and who they were, also, althouigh one could sign anonymously). BTW, this was done with MoveOn.org petition deal, or whatever it is called. The person who got this organized said that this was the best online petition package, she thought. I wonder whether there are similar packages for nonprofit fundraising.
Can you set up this blog as a 501c(3) nonprofit? To accept funds as tax-free donations? If that is too complicated, do you know of a 501c(3) that would accept the blog as an associated project and could accept tax-free funds for you? I think Parry’s Consortium News is a nonprofit, also I think Tom Englehardt at TomDispatch. Do you have friends who can research this? How much it costs to set up in Florida or wherever? What the requirements are? Do you have a lawyer friend?
If you could do that, you could be either an employee or a freelance subcontractor of the entity. As someone mentioned you need to be aware of tax implications of all of this. But that is true for any moneys you accept, and don’t underestimate the power of the IRS to try to make your life miserable and shut you down via tax laws.
Maybe set up a box at the old or new blog that has donation buttons. Or special ongoing donation thread.
Maybe frame this money issue as, say, supporting a growing community’s Truth work, as opposed to supporting you personally. A lot of cads have set themselves up as churches in order to accept nonprofit funds. Just an idea . . .
Seriously, I have read that churches are actually the most effective nonprofit fundraisers in the country. One reason: Donations may be small, but they are regular. Secular nonprofits have been advised to try to copy some strategies that churches employ.
Money II
“Cloud sourcing” seems like a good idea. I am not very cyber-sophisticated but I have contributed to a Kickstarter project. Recently I saw an excellent independent documentary film on a progressive topic. I was wondering who paid for it, and saw at the end that it had been a Kickstarter project. Perhaps the book project you mentioned would qualify as a Kickstarter project. It is supposed to result in a creative product of some kind. There are other options besides Kickstarter. People who do Kickstarter state how much they need, and how close they are getting to their goal. I think this is a good incentive.
For starters maybe sort out the best legal entity that can receive funds. Is it best to do so individually, or to create a buffer entity between donors and you? Un the latter case, are there expenses involved in doing that?
Second, make it as easy as possible to donate from the blog page. Maybe create a permanent box on the homepage of the blog that clearly lists donation options and has buttons to click where relevant. Here you might even have a “thermometer” device that shows how much has been given. Seeing the thermometer go up can actually motivate people to cough up something.
Third, give a concrete idea of how much is needed. I think that nudges people to donate.
Dear Saker
I have thought on this before.
I am sorry indeed to know about your plight and not being able to assist you, as more or less in the same situation, and further in argentina we are forbidden to send money abroad nor i am able to purchase from amazon either, say, a postcard.
kind regards, and my hearted encouragement and gratitude
Patagonian
Crowd Funding:
$20-25 for a book to be published by Aug.15th, 2015
Subject of book: Russia by Saker (exact details of content to come).
Thus, the money flows in now, the book gets done and goes out as ebook (epub or mobi version good for Apple or Kindle). It can be read on any device.
The funding is like a subscription. They get the blog and more of a sane, productive Saker and the big payoff is the book.
There can even be pages with their subscriber names or alias if they want. (+$5 ?)
The book can also be produced for serial publication. (for instance, if it were 240 pages total, then it could go out in 40 page increments.) They wouldn’t have to wait until it is all one big book. (Just an idea, but it is doable.)
For $35-50 it could be hardback or paperback (TBD as the project gets designed).
So, it is more than a donation. It comes in a short term funding time frame, and the subscribers get a product worthy of the money they put up and the time you invest to produce the product.
Fair exchange, and a time frame enough to produce a quality effort.
The crowd funding is a subscription (purchase contract, in essence). It has no middle man money fees. All the money goes to the project. The author has money for his work. The subscriber gets a book.
Just a rough idea. But if 1500 or 2000 subscribers came on board, it could work out to relieve the money problem, and get a product out that is sorely needed.
One other thing:
I looked at an analytics report on the blog and it indicates FB (I despise it) is source for 18% of traffic to the blog. So, FB page might be useful to grab a wider audience once all the problems are worked out.
Having published two books in recent times I believe the project has merit. (of course I do.)
Let’s see if the Crowd Funding Subscription idea can solve the Saker Blog money problems.
It is simple.
Direct.
Value for value transaction.
Finally, if a Saker book on Russia existed, who wouldn’t be over at Amazon ordering it?
Of course, some idiots named Anonymous, but really, it would be a hot item for all of us who want information on the real Russia, not the piñata Russia pounded by the West’s media dogs.
I can’t wait to read it and write a review under my Apple and Amazon aliases. (I love aliases.)
Saker,
You could do a fundraiser, similar to how independent films are made.
I trust Kickstarter.
https://www.kickstarter.com/canada
You may also want to consider having some of your post (some not all) be view by subscription only.
Or, be subscription only for 3-4 days and then go view all.
Another consideration … more guest writers.
Donation
Done and remember to take some time for yourself and family. I do think you are heading in the right direction.
Ingrian (formerly known as whattherussia):
Probably not an option, but I can help you get a job for about $4000 a month tax free here in Saudi Arabia teaching. I’m paying off my student loans this way. I spend about $200 a week all included. 25 hours of work a week. Turns ten years of debt payments into 1.5 for me. I can also afford to help my ex-wife through college. I wouldn’t mind donating, but the available methods aren’t ideal for me. Any chance for email transfer?
Btw, People will probably hate me and I don’t know about the technicalities, but I suggest limiting the length of reader comments. People will find ways to be brief. Could put up a link to George Orwell’s famous writing tutorial.
Saudi Arabia is like minimum security prison and I have no excuse, so if you trust me, could I just commit to an hour or two of moderation a day?
http://vk.com/trefz
Charge $30 per six months. Not to chase away newbies allow 3 free visits. At any time you can raise the rate for new sign-ups and renewals. The rate chosen should be enough to pay for some kind of help.
Are you familiar with the speech-driven wordprocessor? My doctor uses one and I was astounded at how cheap it is.
Re: Russia doing such a poor job at responding to info warfare. The new site by Russian Academy of Sciences, New Eastern Outlook, (journal-NEO.org) is terrific. RT has become more minimal, always stuck too close to MSM, failed to name the truth re ISIS, etc. Only on Ukraine was it pretty good.
Your coverage is unique. The deep background like the Islam multipart article is irreplaceable.
Dear Saker:
I’ve been a constant reader of your blog for some time now, and while there have been instances in which I completely disagree, that doesn’t mean I don’t value your work, your efforts and the time you dedicate to offer very enlightening analysis/sitreps, especially on the Ukrainian conflict. I’ve watched very enthusiastically how the audience grew and disappointed to see some people leave, sometimes with apparent no good reason. Your blog definitely stands out in the midst of all the propaganda, lies, and plain ignorance. I will continue with the contributions as soon as I’m financially stable again.
I second Grieved’s proposal regarding the comments moderation. This issue cannot go on as it is, it’s very time consuming for you and frustrating for the audience when they don’t see their comments posted in a reasonable amount of time. And yes, please let’s get rid of the “anonymous” and encourage the use of a name or at least a nick.
Can’t thank you enough for all your hard work and sharing it with us. Take care.
Grieved’s comment about having comments appear in realtime or something close to it would be fabulous.
—Penelope
dear Saker
Thank you so much for your passion,
commitment to truth as best you and other Saker contributors can know, your hard work, your honesty and strength in expressing your own vulnerabilities. We all need help from time to time and there is no shame in that. For someone who gives so much it is our turn to give in response not just funds but positive intent to the Saker team.
I have found free content along with paid content an extremely frustrating experience. Crowd funding or fundraising drives are worth a good effort. Strongly recommend a monthly donation setup as it could lead to a more stable income for the venture. Even a very small stipend from many can perhaps bring the financial stability required. Use a trusted moderator or two, delegation is a skill to be mastered and of course would do you well as you are already well into that process. Please find time for quality rest/meditation and your family. It will serve you well. I am sending what I can financially and will look to see if a monthly option is available to us donors.
You will survive and thrive.
Warmest Regards
Forget Adsense, you get no control over what rubbish they put on which you don’t want to be associated with. You also don’t want larger sponsors, as “he who pays the piper….”
Can someone who knows more about it, please look into GoFundMe and other crowd-funding sites?
Saker, you absolutely must set up most of the moderation to be automated. Those people who register or give email addresses could be allowed to post immediately, after a few posts that show they are not trolls or spammers. This was already happening on the new blog but can be refined.
I don’t know if you want Up and Down flagging (it can be badly abused), but you could add abuse reporting,in case something nasty slips through. This would let all users mark things a moderator should look at. Letting volunteers moderate incoming would have to involve giving them admin access to the blogs.
People should use a name. A fake invented user name is no less anonymous than “anonymous”. On the other hand you need some way to donate truly anonymously. Because of the sensitive nature of the blog, many may not like the idea of their real name, email address etc being on your servers, connected with enough bank detail to make them traceable, in case it gets hacked.
Dear Saker,
The solution is difficult. Informing the public of the issues / danger facing humanity in these times is very important. The challenge is in actually motivating people to actually get involved (to make the decision to no longer be a bystander / solely information consumer or couch supporter).
The MSM is dying as it is built on advertising / revenue with no real investigative journalism (so there is a huge trust issue as anything important is not reported or clearly biased) as most people can see through the façade / web of lies. People long for a solution – so far it is having to spend lots of time and energy to find the truth on the net by visiting many different sites / media sources – of which your resource is great!
I truly believe the future lies in the crowd-funding model, where the people can build their own informed world view (rather than the one being sold to them) and be a part of creating a new future, but this requires focussed campaigns / solutions and organization of people and ideas into something tangible.
In essence, the committed majority need to stop being information whores (as they already understand the lines in the sand) and start organizing into groups based on their skills, knowledge and ability. Websites /apps/tools can be built to start supporting and bringing people together and crowd funding campaigns.
Learn -> Organize -> Act
What if the solution lies in creating a new type of media organization where anyone can contribute raw content (video clips/articles/etc..) on a topic, that can then be moderated and true investigative journalism/historical perspective could be attributed by fine individuals like yourself to add context? I think this would be something that would bring together many bloggers like yourself, and people would be willing to donate to such a cause (as it would have utility by saving people time / more content /content aggregation). It would also allow people to create campaigns to do something on the ground to support oppressed people or change opinions by cutting through the propaganda.
I’m a web developer so naturally all solutions look like web apps to me / like all problems are nails to a hammer. I’m just worried that knowledge is only power if people actually act and change reality i.e. “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing” –Edmund Burke.
Saker, you are doing your part! It’s time for the rest of us to step up to the plate and organize to build a better future together.
For now, supporting the Saker with a donation would be a wonderful first step as he has truly been an inspiration to all of us.
In the long term, can we do more? Or are we relegated to watching the slow motion train wreck from our computers as the world catches fire and burns around us?
Saker T shirts, with beautiful falcon images, logo / words in all languages for the 6 Saker blogs, with information about and sales from separate website?
I have no idea how to do something like this, any ideas and advice welcome and will send donation in the meantime, small sadly:(
For comparison, here is the donations page of Global Research—in many ways an analogous case:
https://store.globalresearch.ca/donate/
They have a “recurrent monthly donation” option.
I don’t know if anyone’s already mentioned this, but you might consider using Patreon for donations. The key thing about Patreon is that it’s based on the idea of giving a small amount (like a dollar even) every month pre-authorized. It’s fairly new and has been growing fast.
Another interesting thing about it is that, while the site takes a chunk of the money, it’s a flat fee from the total money people donate on Patreon. So if you donate a small amount to one person, OK, quite a bit of that goes to fees. But if you donate a small amount each to half a dozen people, the fee isn’t taken off each, it’s taken off your total before you split it. Donate $10/month split among a few people you want to help out, and the bite taken out of each share is not that big.
At any rate, bottom line, a blogger I follow recently canned his ads (due to annoyance with the way Google was handling the whole thing), and went on Patreon in hopes of compensating for the loss. He did a rather embarrassed low-pressure pitch for it, and found that the result was around four times what the ads had been bringing in. And the likelihood is that the Patreon model of little amounts each month automatically will suffer far less from donor fatigue, giving you a steadier, more predictable stream of income.
http://www.patreon.com/
I don’t have time to read all the responses, but I too believe that a monthly subscription would be the right thing to do. I send money monthly to a few other websites – a small subscription, such as $5 or $10. Many people can probably afford that. I just did the math on that and given you have developed such wide readership I think this could bring in a substantial sum for you each month. It is the simplest solution. I would be happy to subscribe and will buy any books or other products you might sell. Regards, pcz
Sell something: books podcasts etc take time to produce, when time is another thing The Saker is short of. T-shirts and St George ribbons have to be bought/made and posted. Does someone want to do it?
Membership: 70,000 visitors won’t sign up just to find out what it’s about. Those who feel $10 a week is easier on their budget than one-of $50 might choose to make a recurring 9automAatic) donation as “membership”…in fact it can be offered as such. But people warning of the IRS are right, it must be water-tight, in case they’re looking for a way to shut you down. Paypal and some other schemes let you sign up for monthly but it’s hard to stop if you need to.
Other sites? the governments of Novorossiya make announcements on Facebook and so does Kiev and Moscow. It’s no longer just for family. Put teasers on it, or news reports, and on the Russian and other language versions, too. Others can post on FB too, so not all one person’s work.
Quadruple the coverage and halve the work — top every front page with headlines or teasers from the OTHER LANGUAGE blogs and add a translate button to them (which I emailed about).
Dear Saker, Igore those who call you Putin’s Agent. These are Western Agents and are paid to say those. Remember once Putin said “No matter what you do they will always have a lots of manufactured things against you. So better ignore those and do what is right.” “DHARMA” is the most important thing. The entire WEstern media is a JOKE and for that matter their poodles. So don’t worry do what you are doing keeping the “Dharma” as wittness. You are doing excellent job. The west wants absolute blockade of TRUTH. Unfortunately this a TRUTH and what an Irony. BUT TRUTH couldn’t be blockade..
Thnx & Regds
San
Saker,
Just a thought, might be fun and perhaps a family effort: How about selling “Saker” T-shirts on your site? Lots of potential, not to mention – good promotion for your efforts.
Pictures of the falcon, St George’s ribbon, …..
Well, I’ve always wanted to contribute, even with Novorussia, but systems like Paypal ask me all my personal data to transfer, name and others. Not to say that Iin this region where I live, really small, I would not want my bank account would be a charge payable to The Saker. Understand me, Saker, is for security. From the moment that have been discussed here that you know that this blog will probably read some security services, it seems unwise.
I would be willing to contribute to a future subscription if there was a way to pay anonymously, as “elsi” only.
On the other hand I’d be happy to buy the book, in my case, while I do not use e-reader, I would like a paper copy, I understand that at a higher price, of course.
As for the comments, I use now too long to read information out there and bring here what I find interesting for everyone. As the situation seems so serious, I take it for what it is, as an informational war, and neglect other aspects of my life, like keeping my house, I do it myself, not to mention professional aspects, as my ongoing training, essential in my field, or meet friends, to whom I am certainly neglected.
If the comments made it difficult for you to do your work on the blog, Saker, I would let also to comment. Really, I can not offer as a correspondent, and as moderator, or ride The Spanish Saker (although I´d love) because my time is limited and mainly for my lack of computer skills ( I mentioned yet my problems with Google Ghrome, not been able to use it more at the moment).
If I post links here is with the aim of informing and Saker yourself have more data for your analysis. But if it is excessive, please let me know.
Well I hope you find a way to contribute that is secure for all and hope everything is resolved.
Rest and take care, Saker.Write when you can. A hug.
Hello Saker,
At the end of every article, I suggest:
“Did you find this article informative? Your help is needed to keep the Saker Blog going. If you are able, please make a donation”
Then have small donation butons (Paypal etc) next to the announcement.
The announcement should be obvious without being glsring.
Regards,
Michael
[from Blue]
Sort of tongue in cheek:
find some rich Russian on our side and ask them to write columns or do some work to support the cause. Maybe they will tell you they have no time but give a $100,000 so they don’t feel guilty…
Seriousy, for someone who is really wealthy what is a huge amount for normal people is a drop in the bucket for them — talking about people whose income is a hundred, thousand, or more times other people. From my financial condition people who buy steak or store-bough pizza look rich. But I don’t think people with that kind of money think about it or understand what a difference they could make without even feeling it.
You have to get some people for tech managers. Try to do that yourself and it will eat you alive. You have to become a geek, and that takes *all* your time — just to try to keep up with all the changes.
One item you could sell is DVDs of all the stuff on the site from the past, which is more convenient that trying to access it online, and also saves bandwidth. It would take long for a geek to create a good index and search facility too. And it wouldn’t cut off those who can’t afford it from access.
You also need to stop for while and get your breath, and consider it from a bit of distance, like an artist or writer who steps back from his work to get a different perspective. Take a couple of days and reorient, and let the commenters and guests keep the news coming. You are moving from the position of just a writer and analyst to a manager, and you have to evaluate, and figure out what to do with that and how you want to handle it — and that’s more than only the technical aspect. It’s like you can’t be a writer and an editor, or a painter and a critic at the same time — you can alternate, but you have to switch modes to do both. And you need some time to be just a human being too or you’ll burn out like a meteorite.
There’s no way around it: no one can do everything, and you have to put some time into organizing the process, and developing some managers to help.
__Blue
Back to the war for a minute, guys. Apparently Azov battalion has not been given armament by Kiev. They’ve been BUYING IT, on the black market, directly from the Defence Ministry (the proceeds did not go into government coffers). Their purchaser and the journalist she told the story to have been arrested and charged with “undermining state security”.
Ukrainian links
http://uainfo.org/blognews/419721-poroshenko-podtverdil-chto-prikazal-yareme-posadit-zhurnalista-napisavshego-o-torgovle-oruzhiem.html
http://gazeta.zn.ua/internal/lozh-ubivayuschaya-_.html
Story was printed a month ago, we need someone who can monitor Ukrainian media.
Dear Saker,
If you are feeling overwhelmed and your thesis has been sidelined, I would humbly suggest not taking on any new projects (e.g., a book or podcast). Having been through a doctoral program, I know how grueling a thesis can be. Like the new blog, any new projects will only introduce more complexity and uncertainty into your life.
Regarding finances, how about a funding drive? Set a target date, a modest but meaningful goal (in USD that can help you and your family), and then put a notice and percent indicator at the top of this blog. Every day or two, you tally the donations coming in and update the percent indicator. I will donate, and I’m sure others will too. We’ll get feedback when we visit your site each day that the donations are coming in, or not. If not, that will be a signal to the community that more of us need to contribute. I see many sites that use this strategy and it seems like it works.
Finally, please take any time you need to rest and think about how best to proceed.
anonymous-
saker, your blog is illuminating the world ,belive me.
so thanks a lot for that.
please take care of your health and family which comes first.
better to not allow too many coomnets or auttomatically edit it through software or no editing at all rather than wasting time on comments and taking time off writing more important things.
we all are grateful to yoyu for the valuable information and views.
so pelase keep up but donot let it overwhelm you- your health is more important.
sadly russia is too stupid to realise what an asset you could have been -russia wastews money on useless lavrov and his blabbings.
take care saker.
you can keep a graph or something for raising money every 2 or 3 months so that people can see how much is needed and how much has been contributed.
with best wishes.
ps- send the donation again just now-
anon-dk
sent you first donation. I support my NPR classical music station, because I listen all the time, and visit your site daily, so I feel the obligation.
chuy
I have prayed that God may help you.
Do you have a trusted friend in America who can cash checks for you? The friction involved in not sending checks makes things difficult. “Never make it hard for people to give you money.”
Keep up the good work…
The following suggestions might seem counter-intuitive.
1. Host the present blog(s) on the Icelandic server.
2. Invite co-operators to design/ facilitate moving from server based to distributed based solutions.
3. Don’t develop the new blog.
4. Don’t moderate – understand the opponents have an interest not to swamp the blog, since swamping like a snail leaves a trail, swamping closes a potential datastream, and creates another datastream.
5. Forget intellectual property.
The total content including comments comprise the blog, not only the heading contribution.
Share this widely bez platna.
6. Widen opportunities for authoring heading contributions.
This is one pathway to transcend the present notion of media.
I look at it this way. Saker’s blogs and insights have helped me a lot. Much more than the last 3 books I bought. I think it is fair to pay the Saker the value of 3 books. And I will do that every year. In such a way I pay for what I get, and the Saker can do the work that he does for me.
Dear Saker,
People need to be frequently encouraged and reminded to donate. Don’t be shy. You are providing a vital service. Even small periodic individual amounts add up and can create over time a large potential pool of donors/supporters that includes those not in a financially strong position, but are kindred in spirit and interest.
I support Katherine’s and others’ suggestion that you be more specific about how much you need, and the thermometer-type/progress report idea is imo a good one.
Frequently do more brainstorming on finances as new ideas may be forthcoming. Already in these comments I have learned new possibilities.
A key advantage you have is your command of, or working knowledge of, several languages. Many people do purchase DVDs. These can be produced and reproduced quite easily and inexpensively. With a nod at the fact that right now you are overwhelmed in the tsunami, what I wonder is this: what about, eventually, given your facility with various languages, audio or skype interviews of interesting personages, with various languages available in translated transcripts , bundled into a saleable DVD?
the solution to your money problem:
at least 20,000 visitors/day x $5(once) = $100,000
put the donation button on your blog and just ASK for at LEAST five dollars. i know it is difficult for you to ask that but, IT JUST MIGHT WORK!
can people send you cheques and write “pay to cash”? People can send it by registered mail perhaps, so it doesn’t get stolen by the USPS but this may be a solution, no? If it’s delivered to a p.o. box, there is no signature required. just thinking out loud here.
On Shadow blogs, you could create a post here as a place holder and add a link to the shadow blog with someone to look after it the article would be only on the shadow blog for now, each article will have a new shadow blog to go to so you could use every one who volunteered to look after it their own article to look after…
You could copy the info into the original post here at the end of the month so google can index it and you have it here for history.. Since Google dont index comments its not necessary to move comments back. You dont post the article here originally because then there is no difference than now.
You could put more than a single article on each shadow blog depending on how things develop. This way the entire maintenance of the blog could be unloaded to other people.
I know money wont fix all the issues. You still need people to take tasks off your hands. At least the site rips could be incorporated into their own sub-domains moderated by the authors themselves? At least it would give them a sense of ownership and willingness to do more.
Yes I am thinking about a distributed architecture all glued together by a central server. Like Google..
I know blogger has some pretty advanced things but the simplest way is usually the best and best not to use all that. And it would allow you to accept help and build trust and a relationship with those you dont know.
I believe a book or podcast would be fantastic, not only would you get my purchase but im sure many others as well. There is just so much information on this blog that a book would simply be a great reference point for not only further reading but for a better understanding of the situations across the world that are typically ignored. I was surprised to hear about how independent this blog truly is, and for that you have gained much respect from me. The truth will always prevail in the end and it is efforts like this that will truly create a difference in not only the present but in the future.
First let me say that your blog and the work that you do is extremely valuable, you are shining a light for many of us to follow. You are valued and appreciated.
I am in my 70th yr, comfortable, alone with dog in my home in the forest on the west coast of Canada. The last few months have been one of education as I discovered all the blogs of independent news. I discovered yours thru SOTT and soon realize the value and depth of you analysis. I want to make a difference as do all your readers and contributors but what can I do?
You just gave me the answer, I have the resources to contribute to you financially, I also have a voice and am not afraid to use it even if I am the only one speaking. If each one of us who read you blog were to contribute $1 per month x how many thousand, your financial problems would be solved. The truth of my convictions comes when the rubber hits the road, talk is really cheap as we all know.
So I want to issue a challenge to anyone who reads this, how strong are your convictions, what is your freedom worth to you? What is the value of this blog and it’s message to you and your life?
For me it is worth $100 right now and I will endeavour to make sure this is not a one time thing. I stand for what this blog stands for, the truth.
Btw: I use my name because I am willing to stand for what I have to say.
Guys you can not make the blog a pay site!
Many of us have a hell of a time making web payments even if we had the money. You live in the west so you dont know the problems with currency exchanges and as you know visa etc dont work exactly all over the globe. Things like webmoney, paypal, payza let you collect small amounts easily but cause problems when the amount gets bigger than a few K and then they will ask you for ID and social security numbers and stuff and you have to sometimes mail in stuff to get verified. But they are all anonymous payment systems except to the companies themselves when you withdraw funds.
One thing I keep mentioning is they already know who you are. Its like all these sites aggravate your info and create your web profile and have a pretty good idea of you anyway even if you dont give them your info. Once paypal asked me a security question I never entered about where I had lived, and it had all the places I lived at and I was shocked. Facebook even knows your contacts and their names. People never gave facebook their phone numbers but it cross indexed with info and made its own. You can cash checks at those check cashing places and even a bank account by writing pay to CASH and they dont enter your own info on the check. But those have to be checks issued in the US only. You could use travelers checks the same way by buying them in US$ where it is available. You can even usually buy US$ at the same place.
It took me many years to learn how to move around and do this stuff. It is very difficult in many countries. You get spoiled by how easy it is to do stuff in the US.
Put an online video game on your site where you can punch Pornochenko in the face… charge one dollar per minute and you will make a fortune!
Hi,
You do excellent work for which I thank you. I sent you $10 USD from Canada. I used PayPal and it was quick and easy. PayPal provides a tiny message box. This is what I wrote to you.
“suggestion: remove comments entirely until you have the money/means to moderate them. We want to know what YOU have to say. The rest is great but not at the expense of your health. From a burned out, disabled, former business owner. Oh, and, THANK YOU!”
I think you should be aware that you have been referenced by Paul Craig Roberts (no link, sorry) and RUSSIA INSIDER, ( http://russia-insider.com/en/politics_ukraine_opinion_media_watch/2014/10/10/06-29-54pm/wests_ignorance_ukraine_atrocities ).
Good luck and may God bless you and your family.
Agree with Rik Negus, Alien Tech, and others. I’ve gotten a lot from your blog, so I just sent USD 50 by PayPal.
Saker, a funding drive would not be difficult to set up. You’ve already got a donate button. Why not move it to the top of the blog, add a thermometer, end date, and tell us what you need, money-wise, to bring the stress level down and get on track with your studies?
If your regular blog visitors really value (and like) what they find on your blog, they will be willing to pay for the privilege – a modest monthly amount. You have to make payment easy for them so a subscription service is best. Subscribers represent the best chance of other purchases – podcasts, books, t-shirts, whatever. Regular subscribers are also the best source for donations when you run a periodic fundraising campaign. Good Luck!
Saker, I don’t think the book and subscriber stuff will work, not enough… but I think crowdfunding is a fantastic idea…I wish I knew more about it…I wonder if there is someone who is good at it, but needs to be paid…then maybe the community could come up with that money…
On Catherine Austin Fitts “Solari.com” there is a profile of a crowdfunder…
http://www.ted.com/talks/amanda_palmer_the_art_of_asking?embed=true
I’m not an organizer, but maybe someone who can’t contribute financially could look into this…that would be more productive than not making comments….
HiSaker…me again…yes, I think your blog is good enough to pay for…yes, perhaps subscriptions would be useful…
Catherine has some stuff that’s free and her interviews with really good people have to be paid for…
Maybe you could have interviews with Alexander Mercouiris and Mikeil Kharzin and others once every month that cost $$
Just a note about paypal to all those who would contribute if it wasn’t for paypal..
Paypal is fine…you know, it might want a little info the first time,but once you’re signed up its a very convenient way to be a consumer…for small amounts of money.
Come on you guys… what an excuse !!
If you like this post, please text XXXXX to send me 5 dollars.
How hard is that? Put it at the end of your Sitreps — in fine print — so I don’t feel like a guilty shit everytime I have to read one of these posts.
40000 hits on on a good day, with a 1% uptake, that’s 2 grand.
I don’t know anything about the logistics or fees but I would gladly text you $5 right now if the option were available. It would make me feel better because I feel a sense of responsibility but I’m even more of a financial wreck than are you.
To readers: If you are relatively well off and enjoy reading this blog then I don’t know WTF is your problem. Donate for f-k sakes!
Now I’ll return to my preffered disposition of being a know it all a-hole and point out that money ruins EVERYTHING. We’ll never defeat the Anglo-Zionists by crowd sourcing anything. They would never let true crowd sourcing happen (I’d bet) because it is much too dangerous. They prefer to keep you chasing bullshit and that’s all that’s even been successfully crowd sourced from what I can discern. Surely by now you must be begining to understand the nature of the psychopathic Anglo-Zionists and the meaning of full spectrum dominance. I suspect it will be impossible to follow my suggestion on texting donations but I still think you should give it a try.
Do not lose sight of your #1 talent Saker — and you just pointed it out yourself. You have the POWER to derail the AZ media all by yourself. Holy shit man! How have you been manuevered into a position where blowing it is even a possibility? I feel I’m being almost sycophantic constantly pointing it out but you are not grasping the reality of what you’ve accomplished. You write it down but it’s still completely surreal to you and you’re not dealing well with it.
Also stop focussing so narrowly on Ukraine and Russia. I’d love to read an update on Dieudonne for example. Your community is a treasure. Think of how you will keep these people engaged and do it immediately. You can’t ride this pony forever even if Ukraine turns into a re run of the Vietnam War.
I am seriously worried for you Saker. Your momentum is slipping partly because of the cooling off of events in Ukraine but mostly because of the poorly executed expansion. Actually, you missed the boat entirely during a very critical period of negotiations.
Tell me, where are your friends from Russia Insider? Look at their rollout and compare it to yours. Their website is perfect. Someone has unlimited funding apparently. Should I believe it is a coincidence that they are making their effervescent appearance at the precise moment you are threatening to disappear?
Someone is fucking with you Saker and I promise this is the last time I’ll say it.
Hi Saker!
Your blogg is the main source for what is realy going on in the world and Ukraine. Here in Sweden the media lying all the time about what’s happening in the Ukraine and especially in Russia. I am sorry that i can’t help you with money because I have no job but I hope this will change soon.
Benny
Dear Saker,
thank you so much for your excellent blog.
In my humble opinion, it is a very good idea to aggregate your blog entries and additional deep insight information, interviews and so on into a regular book series (6 month -> 1 book?). These books can be for sale that allow you to have a regular income.
I would not suggest to build a pay wall around your blog, forcing people to pay for reading your thoughts and analysis. However, the donation button and donation hints should be more exposed indeed, reminding the people that maintaining such a blog is hard work.
Another topic is that some people may be afraid to donate, because they fear repression in the future. Financial transactions in electronically form for donations are fully traceable by many public and private agencies. I can imagine that in the future in some countries financial support of certain people/blogs that have an opposite opinion to MSM, will be seen as a criminal act (support of terrorism, you name it …). Hence, it would be important to provide fully anonymous donation system. I would strongly suggest to use anonymous crypto currencies like DarkCoins [1] for donation (important: Bitcoins are not anonymous).
However, i have send you 50$ via Amazon and hope that this tiny donation will help a bit.
I will try to regularly donate to your blog. Well not 50$ per month, but i think about 3$ – 5$ per month sounds reasonable.
Best wishes from US occupied Germany
[1] https://www.darkcoin.io/
Try affiliate programs, like Amazon. They generally work like this (and I believe this is how Amazon works). You put a link to something relevant on your site, lets say a book. (Or some Made in Russia products). Viewer clicks through. Puts the item in the cart, plus a few other items. Viewer buys. You collect a percentage on everything in the cart, not just the book. Of course there are restrictions. The viewer must complete the purchase within 24 hours. Anything that was already in the cart or on a wish list does not count. Viewer does not pay a premium because they used your affiliate link. They pay the usual Amazon price.
Avoid subscription models. Who’s the most likely to subscribe? English speaking countries and the EU. First because these are the countries with higher disposable incomes, and second because of the technical issues involved. Although Paypal is an option in over 200 countries, there are many places where it doesn’t make a lot of sense. In Ukraine, you can only send money using Paypal; you cannot receive, which minimizes usefulness. Because of Paypal restrictions, there are other services that make much more sense in this part of the world. Plus the signup page for Paypal in Ukraine is in English. (No, they do not use Russian like the Paypal signup page in Russia). Plus, there are transaction fees added and currency exchange fees added, etc. A subscription model might scare away the people with this most insightful perspectives. Namely, those who have suffered the most at the hands of the AngloZionist Empire of Chaos.
Some ideas:
– put a small donate button or link below every post. We just forget!
– run advertising of *your* choosing. For example pro-russian merchandising (ie. Putin t-shirts, etc..) I wear them all the time :), books, survival gear. Anything that you trust
Saker, Where Wolf knows you and this site, he knows the current climate, and gives spot on advice, many others do as well but I have the feeling that you don’t always heed it.
Fantastic that you have been so open with the financial situation current in your life!
Take peoples money and professional and wise advice gratefully, they are given in hope and in love.
A community is a shared initiative, share it out then, and spread more tasks and responsibilities – don’t worry you’ll still be at the centre!
Ukraine and Russian developments are of huge and vital world significance, you know this -keep going with the sitreps – there have not been enough – drop the stuff that is overloading you, including Russia Insider, thesis, moderation, etc, and concentrate your power on this whole amazing and unique Saker blog initiative.
Hello Saker,
Just made a donation which I will do monthly. Just a small amount of 16 dollars since my income is very very little. But I think also many small donations on a monthly base can help you out. You do make a difference in this world and your important work needs to be supported. Thank you for everything you do to get the true information out.
Warm regards,
Ingrid
the Netherlands
“Problems” and “mistakes” are potential catalysts to lateral thought.
To use a communications metaphor
the message is apparently precluded by the medium, so mutate the medium.
Timing and point of interventions are keys, but the master key is purpose.
It appears that your purpose is implicit since you index the open lateral question as 5 and precede it with questions 1 to 4, thereby implying precedence through interaction with socially learned “norms” of the “audience”, despite your mild protestation to the contrary.
Your examples of “success” add to this notion of implicit purpose.
This is a technique used to circumvent/preclude thought and maximise possibility of acceptance of proferred “options”.
” I can only surmise that this the “not without honor, except in your own country, and in your own house” phenomenon at work.”
Try not to surmise, as outlined before it is a major weakness best left to opponents.
The effort to date like any interactive dynamic process have been testing hypotheses, although perhaps not conciously.
Machiavelli said that the prince who would change anything has the least friends. He surmised that it was because of seeking change, thereby obscuring the possibility that a component of the barrier to friendship was being a prince.
Your “problems” are not unique and your options 1 to 4 are not transcendant and hence will likely displace/replicate the “problems”.
I will make some suggestions separately to minimise correlation.
If it’s mostly about money, you need a product to sell. Maybe some economist or marketing friend could help you ? You could make *some* of the articles pay-per-view.
If it’s about work/information overload you ‘just’ need to focus. What’s important to you, what do you want to accomplish with this blog ?
Hello Saker
I understand you’re against making money off this blog, but if it means the difference between the blog and and no blog, I would suggest you think of a way to make money while at the same time making everything as free and available as possible. For example, you could have a two-tier user system in which paid subscribers get instant access to all content immediately as it’s released. Everyone else would have to wait a week or two before seeing it. You could price it as low as $5 a month and at 200 monthly subscribers you will be making some decent money to reinvest or use as you see fit. A measly $5/month is really not asking much, and you have the original content that makes it worth it. My 2 cents.
I sincerely hope a solution is found, there is truly no other place on the internet like this one.
Cheers
How about a Bitcoin donation address? That’s a way to donate anonymous and evade capital controls. You can sell the Bitcoins for USD afterwards.
Hi,
I haven’t read until the end but the halfway it started to sound like “money”….
Well….if this page used to get hits like 200k daily(it’s more than some newspapers)…may be you can think about the taking some commercial ads.
I think if I remember correct I came here first through a link reference mentioned in Asia Times…may be it was Pepe Escobar….
If you’re doing a good job…you will get I’m sure some kind of support….ask Russian Gov….They have lot’s of money….they can support you….
I don’t think donatians will work good on the long jorney
May be what I wrote above sound somehow dumb but…just few ideas
came to my mind
For crowdfunding to be successful, you need to put in as much time as what you put into the blog.
Think of doing less, and not more.
A fundraising drive on the blog would be a good way to go, easy, not time consuming.
Think of having free content and paid content. That is not doing more.
Selling some article about Novorossia: T-shirts, flags, keep a part of the money for the blog and make donation with an another part to help people from Novorossia.
I hope that the blog can remain free to all and is not surrounded by a pay wall. I would hope that enough people can step up to the plate to keep things going so that readers are not turned away by the Wall. Larger web-based media have abandoned this. They lost too many readers. EVen if I were a subscriber I would not want to have to enter login info just to catch up.
I like the idea that someone mentioned of membership. The model entity is a society, e.g, X Conservation Society, the Royal Society (for pursuing science). Def.:
“an organization or club formed for a particular purpose or activity.
“the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals””
It is not a professional or sales organization.
THis might be an idea for creating and naming some kind of nonprofit entity that can receive funds and people’s donations make them members.
I question the T-shirt idea. It costs money to make and distribute. (I personally do not wear any logo T-shirts of any kind, and no only because most T-shirts are unflattering to the female figure. The only good-looking logo T-shirt, from the shape p.o.v., that I have ever seen was Amy Goodman’s for Democracy Now!)
Just to clarify that suggesting an option for automatic monthly donations is not, to me, a “subscription model,” but just a way to donate.
I do think that it is important to make it easy to donate. That is one advantage of the “regular donation” model: You make the decision once, and don’t have to think about it again. Makes it easy. If it can be safely set up.
I am against the idea of relying on Facebook or Amazon for anything! I and many others do not “do” FB. Others I know maintain a very low profile on FB (just to see what their friend’s pictures). So I am against building FB into the fundamental architecture of how things work here. But I am a cyber-dinosaur.
Sort of same goes for Amazon. Hugely convenient, but also hugely intrusive. Personally I don’t like the idea of having “product buttons” all over the place. Then the blog becomes a sales portal.
Same goes for “donate” buttons after every story. One thing I like about the blog is that it is virtually all content, no visual crappola all over the place.
For the time being I guess the simplest way to donate is to send some cash.
To summarize, short, medium, and long-term money ideas (financial triage).
Short/immediate:
State amount needed and keep tally of how much sent. You don’t even need a thermometer. Just a low-tech announcement at top of blog, a la ICH. Goal: $1,000. STill needed: $500. This concretizes the situation and motivates people to contribute immed.
Medium term:
1. Think about org. structure that can receive money. Nonprofit society? Become program of other nonprofit? Find out what is involved.
2. Make adjustments so that readers can set up regular donations.
Longer term
1. Think about “products”? Something you want to do anyhow. Book? DVD? I would forget T-shirts and mugs here. Everything takes time, so stick to the main “product,” which is information and ideas.
2. DVD can become “gift” of membership or donation of threshold amount.
3. Crowd sourcing/Kickstarter for DVD/book. Write description of book project.
One can start making moves for longer-terms tasks while putting short-term tasks into action immed. REmember, your own oxygen mask first!
For me to write a letter to Vladimir Vladimirovich and attach all possible names of The Saker Community, it does not seem so farfetched. As we say here, “niet” what’s ahead, nothing is lost.
Although I am aware that is now more important issues to deal with as the new escalation in Novorussia, he will also be aware of the importance of informational war.
As I heard this saturday in the latest edition of Fort Apache, “the media are the tanks of the XXI century”.