Platinum Accounts Now Available!

[Fearless]

Existing members can now sign up for a Platinum Membership. The price is $49.95/year. Lot of you made that much or more on your first sale here. Now you can give something back and get some perks to boot. To upgrade click on the "Register" tab above while logged in. Then you will see a link to change your current membership plan. Follow that and you're set.

Here are the different levels:

Silver Plan:
- Annual membership fee of $9.95
- Ability to browse the forums

Gold Plan:
- Annual membership fee of $14.95
- All the features included in the Silver Plan.
- Ability to post to the forums.
- Ability to create threads in all forums except the advertising section and the Platinum private forum.
- Ability to send private messages.
- Ability to attend and bid in the live auctions.

Platinum Plan:
- Annual membership fee of $49.95
- All the features of the Gold Plan.
- Ability to list domains for auctions.
- Ability to create threads in the advertising section.
- Access to a Platinum member only forum.
- Ability to have links, colors and size control in your forum signature.
- Get 5 free guest passes for 2 weeks of Gold membership each.
- Discounted SnapBacks® (available shortly)
- 800 DNF$ Bonus Now through March 12, 2003


For now all existing members will have access to the live auctions. Shortly you will need to be a Platinum member to list names in the auction.

For those of you that say you will never pay a penny, it may be several months before you will have to pay. So enjoy while you can.

 

[sornman]

Originally posted by liquidstar
I don't mind paying because I've seen the value of the forums, but how does Joe Newuser decide (s)he wants to spend any money on the site if (s)he can't even browse the site to know whether or not it's worth the money.

This is kind of the point of 'Guest Passes'... If you know someone who wants to join, but not sure if it is worth it, you can give them a guest pass for temporary Gold membership. These are currently under construction.

 

[airnike764]

When you start requiring members to sign up for an your accounts, please cancel my account. I signed up for a free forum and Id like it to stay that way. So if you are going to start charging people, please cancel my account

 

[GeorgeK]

airnike764: Hasn't the information from the forum benefitted you by more than $15 ? (less than the price of 2 domain renewals)

I think for most folks, the benefits of the forum on their wealth far exceeds $15 or $50 or whatever. Some single pearls of wisdom from John Berryhill or others are priceless.

 

[Anthony Ng]

>airnike764: When you start requiring members to sign up for an your accounts, please cancel my account. I signed up for a free forum and Id like it to stay that way. So if you are going to start charging people, please cancel my account

Calm down, airnike764. I don't like to pay either. But you don't need to cancel your account right away. Enjoy it while you can (said gregr). Or if you are that eager to leave to show your discontent, why don't you donate me all your DNF$1,000+? I promise to spend them all before I go.

 

[Tee]

One could also say a members participation has benefiited the forum. I think that is really the proper perspective. If it weren't for the members, there wouldn't be a forum. No money to be made without the members. So, the member is the important one in this equation, a lesson that many learn the hard way. Customer service first - the rest is of relatively little importance.

But alas, there are other message boards that don't charge, and I'm sure there will be more so if one doesn't want to pay, we can go somewhere else if we choose.

I do think charging to browse is an especially bad idea. Giving away passes is not gonna bring in sometimes important stray traffic. Besides, browsing is a limited priviledge. To really play, you will need to pay a lot more.

In a way, i do think this is good as it will make for more use of other boards, which will increase the value of those boards, and give us more options in the end.

Good luck.

 

[Larry]

I'm not opposed to paying.


However, I would like to see far more control over avatars, sigs, tag line under your name...for a Platinum membership.

How about it gregr? What's it gonna take to put me in a new avatar today?

 

[GeorgeK]

I think you get 800 DNF Bucks if you sign up before March 12th? That'll get you an avatar.

I'd have an avatar now, but I'm a perfectionist, and haven't decided what a good one would be, yet.....

 

[Larry]

Yeah...I saw that but I'm looking for the ability to swap it out often.

 

[Anthony Ng]

Correct me if I'm wrong: you'll get that power with 1,000 posts.

 

[Anthony Ng]

>nameslave: Calm down, airnike764 ... why don't you donate me all your DNF$1,000+? I promise to spend them all before I go.

Oh, c'mon, why don't you donate your DNF$ a bit earlier?! LOL! You're REALLY quick in this, gregr.

 

[Jack Gordon]

Originally posted by Tee
One could also say a members participation has benefiited the forum. I think that is really the proper perspective. If it weren't for the members, there wouldn't be a forum. No money to be made without the members. So, the member is the important one in this equation, a lesson that many learn the hard way. Customer service first - the rest is of relatively little importance.

But alas, there are other message boards that don't charge, and I'm sure there will be more so if one doesn't want to pay, we can go somewhere else if we choose.

I do think charging to browse is an especially bad idea. Giving away passes is not gonna bring in sometimes important stray traffic. Besides, browsing is a limited priviledge. To really play, you will need to pay a lot more.

In a way, i do think this is good as it will make for more use of other boards, which will increase the value of those boards, and give us more options in the end.

Good luck.

I have to say I agree. Information on the internet should be free, to the furthest extent possible. Over the last several months I have truly enjoyed this forum and all it has to offer, but domains are not my main business and I doubt I would have paid a penny to be involved in it.

I would like to think that my contributions to this board have been helpful to others, at least most of the time. A board full of members like that is what keeps most of us coming back.

GregR, I think you have built up a terrific resource here, but I'm afraid $50 to fully participate is going to have a detrimental effect. You will keep a high quality core membership and you will probably attract a few more, but I am afraid you will also inspire a mass exodus to your competitors (who up until this point, I haven't even been curious enough to check out)

Will I pay to stick around? I don't know. The only reason I am undecided is because I like it so much here. But that is quite a bit more than I would be willing to gamble with to indulge my domain hobby under normal circumstances. And please understand, when I say this, that $50 is NOT a lot of money to me. I usually carry 2-3 times that in my wallet. It is the principle of paying that for a forum web site that troubles me.

Now I understand that you have invested quite a bit here, and are probably anxious to start earning it back. I would think there are other models you could follow to do that which would give you a revenue stream without turning off so many people (for instance, a per-name auction fee, ebay style)

At the very least, consider charging much less (say, $10) for a full membership. That number is large enough to scare away riff raff but small enough to be "no big deal" for probably 95% of the people here.

I wish you luck, but I have a bad feeling about this....

 

[tassos]

i can t judge gregr's decision to put membership cause he must find a way to have this site working without giving money from his pocket...only think is that many guys earn money from selling here cause they have loooots of d names ,i m only spending money here i spend about 300$ in one action night...ohhh boy i am poor now!:laugh: can i have a platinum for free? you know gregr its not easy to have buyers like me- the million buyer!:embarrass .....
an other idea is to make a live action 1domain=1year platinum
stupid question:if someone doesn t pay and stops being member ,is he allowed to go to italy for free
if not what happens if he allready paid the 50$ ?
how many years platinum can i have if i arrange free 4 days for members in greece?
and final : i ll pay platinum for 2 years for anyone that that makes a small site for me about coins to be hosted under my domain magiccoin.com
thnx

 

[Anthony Ng]

>tassos: and final : i ll pay platinum for 2 years for anyone that that makes a small site for me about coins to be hosted under my domain magiccoin.com

May I ask what do you mean by "small"?

 

[tassos]

small: one page 3 options
1:forum
2:free adv with photo for selling-buing=not online action,just page builder for users
3.a page about magic coins

 

[tassos]

ah, and 4th page a link to dnforum...gregr do i get free platinum?:laugh:

 

[GiantDomains]

The paid membership idea has been a topic for months, searchable on the site in many forum categories.

Thanks to all who have supported the forum, and continue to support it. You will reap the benefits, no doubt.

 

[eddie1278]

I am disapointed at the membership. $49 is a steap price. Porn sites don't even charge that much,lol and thats the most sought after on the net. I think current senior members should get half off for their loyalty of staying on the board and helping the site become what it is now. One more thing is that their should have been a banner on the front page saying be aware of new pricing for access to the board. When I come here I check the new threads mostly sales, and appraisals or something that really catches my eye. In other words if it was on the front page I would have seen this. Again I am just disapointed I still like the board very much.

 

[liquidstar]

hide the cloak and dagger stuff. there's no intent to ruin anything. i am selling a name this week (knockers.org), and would like to sell some in the future. i'm not worried about the money. in fact, i'm carrying $258 dollars in my wallet right now. i make more than enough to pay for memberships for everyone on this forum. i was making a suggestion and an observation. no whining, just trying to contribute. if you'll go and reread what i posted with out your dnforum moderator glasses on you'll see it was very innocent. that's it. this is the only domain forum i visit. who cares?

now you can return to your spy thriller, "everybody is after me" paranoia

 

[Jack Gordon]

Originally posted by GiantDomains
Funny how all the whiners choose today to whine. The paid membership idea has been a topic for months, searchable on the site in many forum categories. Your attempts of sabotage are laughable, and you are showing your true colors.

Thanks to all who have supported the forum, and continue to support it. You will reap the benefits, no doubt.

Hmmm... didn't realize I was whining. Belittling members in good standing who are trying to help you see a mistake (apparently in spite of yourselves) is not very good policy.

Greed has brought down many promising business people - including (especially?) domain speculators. For the record, I'd like to not see that happen with this site.

As I said, I wish you the best of luck. But if you are going to keep working yourselves up into a frenzy every time somebody tries to talk sense to you, you won't even see the crash coming.

 

[Tee]

What else does a silver membership provide other than viewing priviledges? The gold membership references silver " features".