Project Wombat: Donations
Project Wombat is hosted at Dreamhost. Dreamhost has a nice feature whereby people can donate money to a hosting account using PayPal. This page is how you go about doing that.
Some Obvious Questions
- How much does it cost to run Project Wombat?
- As of May 2009, the hosting charges are roughly US$110 per year, and we are prepaid until November 2010. The rate varies depending on how far in advance the bill is paid, and we paid for two years at once.
- As of March 10, 2010, generous list members have donated US$84.60 (after the Paypal deductions) towards the next hosting bill. That’s just a touch below 40% of the next hosting bill! Many thanks to everyone who has donated!
- How much should I donate?
- That’s up to you, but the required minimum is US$0.50. The larger the donation, the less of it (by percentage) is eaten up by PayPal charges. (The charges are, again as of May 2009, US$0.30 plus 5%. So admittedly the percentage eaten by PayPal doesn’t change very much if the donation is more than a few dollars, but it still changes.)
- How do I know this money will be used on hosting fees?
- It would be wonderful if Dreamhost had a page certifying that account holders were unable to cash out contributions, but they apparently don’t, or at least we have been unable to find one.
- For what it’s worth, here’s what the page used to generate the button says:
Just fill out the form below and we'll give you some HTML code to paste into your website that allows any site visitor to make a donation via PayPal towards your bill with us (donations may not be cashed out)!
This is way easier than asking them to buy you a gift certificate, and is more appealing to some visitors because they know their money is going to pay your hosting bill and not being blown on your strange Tickle-Me Elmo fetish!
- We trust that this makes everything clear. Tickle-Me Elmo? Ick.
- Will Project Wombat go away if there aren’t enough donations?
- Probably not. But it will be much easier to justify paying the hosting bills if the amount owed is less than the full hosting rate.
- Are donations tax deductable?
- No. Project Wombat is not a registered not-for-profit organization at the present time. (We aren’t a registered organization period.)
To make a donation, click the button below.
Project Gutenberg
Project Wombat was, for several years, partially hosted by Project Gutenberg. This is no longer the case, but the parting was an amicable one, and so we’d like to remind you here that Project Gutenberg is not only staffed by nice people, they too accept donations which are tax-deductable in many areas. So if you’re making donations, please give them something as well.
