Well, at this time, the votes are 6 for and 1 against.

Here's a crazy idea that I'd like to throw out there for discussion... We all know that the value of the forum is in the contributions (postings and pictures) of our members. Better postings/info, more contributions, and a better "atmosphere" to make people comfortable (i.e., make them want to come back and make them want to participate) will result in more visitors returning more often and, if we run AdSense ads, more income.

I'd like to find a way to give back to the people who are making this forum great. If we put up some AdSense ads, there's a possibility of the forums earning several thousand $ per year. I'd like to take half of that and invest it back into the forums for enhancements and return the other half to the top contributors to the forums.

There are several ways we can work this out, and I'd like to get your thoughts on this. Maybe we can have a discussion here and if we end up with a few good options, we can set up a poll to find out which one we should use.

Here are my ideas... Let's pick a date each year (say, December 1) and take the top 10 or so forum contributors (by messages posted), not including myself, and either:

1. pick one at random and send them a check for 50% of the ad income for the year, or
2. share the 50% of the ad income among the top 10 contributors, with the most going to the top contributor and a sliding scale down to the #10 contributor, or
3. share the 50% of the ad income equally among the top 10 contributors.

The only risk that I can see in this is that it might cause lots of low quality postings by people trying to get their numbers up. That wouldn't be good.

Here is the list of the contributors with over 100 postings as of this moment, with myself excluded:

1. Hub - 884
2. Romans - 512
3. Kruz - 469
4. blue07 - 462
5. Steven14 - 329
6. Rook - 304
7. reevesmreeves - 290
8. Toecutter - 257
9. DogoZX - 256
10. Slowninja - 210
11. Badzx14r - 208
12. JDC - 188
13. Bud0212 - 187
14. juicey69 - 140
15. Philhnnss - 127
16. masszx14 - 115
17. privateer - 108
18. lytnin - 108

If we're going to do this, we should count postings in the current year only.

It's just a wild idea. Maybe it's not a good idea. I dunno. Anyway, we can discuss it as much as we need to.

I'll work on getting the AdSense ads up in the next few days so we can get the income stream started.

Soooo..... Whaddyathink? -bg

good idea but id say just keep the money to yourself. actually monitoring the post count for cash = spammers

Interesting ideas.
I think you should keep the $$$. You've earned it.
If you want to give something else back to us as contributers, send us a T-shirt os something. Hold a monthly contest to see who gets a shirt.

Some ideas:

Bike of the month.
Best "How To".
Greatest adventure on a 14.
Fastest timeslip.
Best Bling.

Ect....

I don't have any objections, as long as it doesn't get like some sites where it seems it's nothing but ads with a little forum somewhere.

I agree with Dogo and Jesse tho, keep the cash for more features/bandwidth, maybe a t-shirt for best "fill in the blank" of the year, or something like that.

Agree with the SHIRT idea-yes-a nice pic of a zx14 on front and back,(an 06 please(blue),with a cool little message of some sort-yes-send me one-I'll wear it PROUDLY!!!!!(I'll pay shipping)!!!

i just want to have a KEEP ME LOGGED IN OPTION ..

What dogo said, and like Bad said - a keep me logged in option would be very nice! Keep profit and send a (custom?) t-shirt every 6 months or something. Or maybe just make it say "I Ride" on the front and "ZX-14" on the back... or w/e.

To keep security high with the "keep me logged in" option, perhaps make it re-authenticate when user accesses his/her profile and whatnot, but for normal browsing/posts just read some code from cookies on visit to know it's the right person and authenticate from that. You probably know how to realize this, but if need any help/advice feel free to P.M., would be glad to help out, I program for living and done quite a bit with web sites and authentication.

i just want to have a KEEP ME LOGGED IN OPTION ..

+1!!!

I also agree with you just keeping the money yourself BG. Or invest it back into the site if you want to reward ALL of us!

You guys are too easy on me... T-Shirts, for goodness sakes. I think we can do better than that.

Toecutter: A single horizontal line of AdSense ads would be very unobtrusive, I would think.

Badzx14r & AlexTheNewb: I think we can use a cookie, and have it automatically log you in. The logout/login is important for those who are using the "Show New Messages" feature, but we can make it automatic when we find the cookie. This is a great idea. I'll get on it.

Thanks. -bg

You guys are too easy on me... T-Shirts, for goodness sakes. I think we can do better than that.

I think most of us like beer and women too.

I want off the list. I clown more than contribute. I'd be in the middle if not posting nonsense as most say anyway.

You cannot pay me enough for this kind of fun you beer chucking keep me from typing in my curse brackets you, you!

Looks like it's mostly been said:
I don't think it's a good idea to encourage noisey posters. Getting your post count up should not be a reason to post.

In my mind, we're all here for the fun of it - we get to talk and read about something we love, and we get to trade info about something we're passionate about.

BG - you're the one stepping up to the line and fronting this effort - you're spending time to improve it, helping users w/ issues, etc.

Thanks for your efforts BG!

-Dennis

I'm for the cookie idea too. I don't want anything back but I nhave concerns otherwise.
The look and feel of this forum is vary light and inviting. Good Fung Schway. Other forums aren't as inviting for some reason, maybe it's the commercialism. I'd like some cool graphics and all but don't let the site get heavy or dark, if you know what I mean.
Let's have a logo contest for the T-shirt idea. I'd love a Jersey shirt with "our" logo on it.
Waddeya think?
Sharkey

I am in agreement with the above.

Keep the money...
Keep me logged in...
A shirt with the forum name would be nice. Black shirt, red graphics in medium please!

BG it all sounds great but I respectfully disqualify myself from the running as a contributor since alaskarider has made it known my posts are all BS and I don't know the first thing about bikes.

Kruz

Well, it seems to be fairly unanimous. I'll get a programmer working on the cookie thing right away.

I would sure not want to do anything to decrease the quality of the messages here...

Thanks for the feedback, guys! -bg

I don not know why, but my computers do stay logged in, at home and at work also. Perhaps you should check into this before spending any $$$ on programmer.

Steven, what browser are you using?

Every morning I come to the site after closing the browser or shutting down computer, whether I use Chrome or Firefox, I am logged out.

T-shirt: I like the idea of "our" custom logo as long as our means something we create together. I honestly wouldn't wear logo of the forums, though, just like I don't wear logos of anything else (be it commercial or non). I think we can do much cooler than that imho

And disqualify Kruz as per his request... maybe not all of his posts are BS, but most of them are...

* Last updated by: AlexTheNewb on 6/23/2009 @ 2:38 PM *

Every morning I come to the site after closing the browser or shutting down computer, whether I use Chrome or Firefox, I am logged out.

And disqualify Kruz as per his request... maybe not all of his posts are BS, but most of them are...

i be logged out too every morning and i don't do no shutdown or turn off and i've got internet explorer 8..

yeah and kruz .. is full of shitt sometimes and knows nothing about motorcycles LMAO

but then again Hub as per manual and default mode it be hacked... whatchasay purrrrrzzy kitty with da sit vibrator

* Last updated by: Badzx14r on 6/23/2009 @ 3:11 PM *

Bad:

There is a "session variable" that expires after a period of time (several hours) from when you last load a web page. I think that what we're talking about doing would keep you logged in basically forever -- at least it would act that way. If you come back and load a page after the "session variable" has expired, it would check your computer for a cookie that we put there, and would log you back in automatically. You wouldn't even know this was going on.

Re: Kruz. Different strokes, I guess. I have always enjoyed his posts on this forum and on the old forum. -bg

BG it all sounds great but I respectfully disqualify myself from the running as a contributor since alaskarider has made it known my posts are all BS and I don't know the first thing about bikes.

Kruz

We need more DRAMA!

Post count and contributing don't go hand in hand IMHO.

Half of my posts are in the FOR SALE section,
and there are also guys on bone stock bikes that can't stop
posting all over the PERFORMANCE UPGRADES...

BG, keep it- it's well deserved and thaks again for the forum.
BTW I wear size L and would prefer a black longsleeve T.

as others have said, keep any revenue urself bg, and if ur ever having a zx14 BBQ just make sure and give me plenty of notice!

oh yeah, and i like the t-shirt idea too, can u make mine long sleeve, fleece lined and waterproof??!!

I agree with all that have said that post quantity does not always reflect quality - and therefore valuable contribution to this fantastic forum (it really is the best bike-specific forum I've ever found!).

I would have thought that if members were to be rewarded with cash/t-shirts/beer coolers, a poll could be set up and all members could vote for who they believe has posted the most informative/accurate/valuable/positive posts over the last X amount of months (eg. 12). Like a "MVP" and/or "All-stars" team!

I also agree with DogoZX that there could be a similar poll/s for "Best Review", "Best Ride Report", "Best ZX14 Photo", "Most Valuable Technical Advisor", etc etc.

I also think that a T-Shirt would be something a lot of us (whether we post a lot or not) would like to purcahse, and personally I wouldn't have a problem paying a bit more than cost to generate more income for the Forum. As some have mentioned reservations about wearing a "Forum logo" (yes, maybe a bit nerdy?), as we all love the ZX14 so much a T-shirt could be more about the bike, rather than the Forum itself (but maybe with the website address incorporated in the design?).

Thanks again to BG for your great work here. I hope you will always feel its "worth your while"!

Thanks again for the feedback. Your points are all well taken.

I'm going to have our designers see what they can come up with for a REALLY COOL T-shirt design. I'll try to get several put together and we can vote on which one to have made up. It may take a couple of weeks, but I'll get back to you.

If anyone has any specific ideas for designs, please pass them along.

I kind of like the idea of a cool ZX-14 picture on the back with "ZX-14" above or below the picture and with "I ride a..." in very large type on the front. But maybe we can come up with something better. -bg