Last Friday night I posted an essay stating that c99p was for sale. It was met with an overwhelming response from the membership that I did not expect. Only meant as a feeler to see if there was any interest in buying the site, it evolved into an effort to save c99p as it stands. My response to that effort was an overwhelming sense of gratitude and love for you folks. Man, I did not expect that, and it touched me deeply. I knew some folks liked this place, but wow, did I underestimate the impact that this site has had on the members who use it. I was just blown away! You folks are the best!

With of that said, after getting many solid inquiries into buying it, the decision is:

NO SALE!

The fundraiser over the weekend has netted right around $3,000.00 in direct donations to PayPal, that does not include donations that will be received via USPS, I don't know what that will amount to until they are received. Dallasdoc, in his excellent and much appreciated recurring monthly donation drive, estimated the monthly pledges at $855.00, the last I saw. For a couple of different reasons the actual recurring amounts when added up in PayPal has fallen just a little shy of that amount, but I have all confidence that Doc's figure is correct. There have been some monthlies coming in today that are just now showing up and some folks have made monthly pledges but were not able to register them with the PayPal payment form (more about that later) And some pledges were in the form of USPS mail, so I have all the confidence in the world that the $855.00 monthly pledges that Doc quoted will in fact be realized.

I've also been in contact with another member (HatTip: Oldest Son of a Sailor) about some small unobtrusive ads that will fit into the sidebars. By the way, I in no way fault any member that isn't able to donate any funds, please don't feel pressured to do so if you are strapped for cash. I have been there before and have done that, I know how it feels. These ads will be experimental for a couple of months to see how they work out. I absolutely hate ads but I think they may be a necessary evil.

With the combination of the recurring monthly contributions and the potential ad revenue I think we can make a go of it. It may not reach the goals that I posted in the comments of the "For Sale" essay, but it may come close enough. We'll rock this house trying though.

I want to thank from the bottom of my heart all that have written fundraising essays, contributed to the cause, posted positive comments and much, much great advice, and generally just being gosh darn good people. I don't want to start listing all those who contributed to this effort because I know I'll leave some out, but thank you all, you know who you are.

A couple of other tangential items; I spent the morning setting up a c99p PopMoney account (Hat Tip: LeChienHarry). Many folks requested a method of direct bank to bank transfers. This will do exactly that, both one time and recurring monthly contributions. You will need to register an account at PopMoney to send transfers, but it's easy to do and very handy as an alternative to using PayPal. After setting up a PopMoney account all you'll need is the c99p email address to transfer the funds directly. You can get that address by sending me a private message by typing my username, JtC, into the "To" field, or by sending me an email using the "Contact Us" link in the site header.

I also contacted PayPal this morning about the inability for some folks to either see the "Recurring Monthly" box or the inability to make a recurring payment at all.

Here's the deal:

Those that can see the box but cannot register a monthly payment, it's because you have to have a PayPal account to setup a monthly recurring payment. Without an account it can't be done. If you don't have a PayPal account you can make a one time payments but you can't do recurring payments.

Those that can't see the recurring Monthly box at all is because you are using an iPad or a handheld device. Pads and handhelds do not have the capability to read certain scripts and that is the case with PayPal. The advice from PayPal was to try another browser and if that fails too, then the only alternative is to use a laptop or desktop to be able to see and fill out a monthly recurring payment. The c99p PayPal code is correct and there is nothing that can be done to correct that problem except by using a lappy or desktop. Not being able to read some scripts is not limited to Paypal, that happens with other applications across the web when using handhelds and pads, it's the nature of the beast.

I'll try to make myself available as much as possible to answer questions in the comments. Again, thank you all very very much. I love you guys!