Blog Post

I’ve been feeling a little burned out over here the last few days. As much as I love YSFHQ, it seems there is still so much more that needs to be built, fixed, and enjoyed. Among the slowly-dwindling veteran and staff list, the sacrifices each one are making to the community continue to grow. Yet, successful websites are not run for free, and as my subscription to the “Free Tier” hosting plan (it’s not actually free, by the way) runs out half a year from now, I am looking for ways to allow YSFHQ and the YSFlight community to continue to grow. The bottom line is, we need more resources to sustain our mission. Last week, we launched advertisements on the forum and homepage (YSFHQ.com) to bring in additional revenue. But almost nobody enjoys seeing them, so I wanted to quickly offer a solution.

Today I am proud to announce the launch of YSFlight Headquarters’ “frequent flyer” program, known officially as YSFHQ First Class. Any member who donates at least $4 is able to receive membership status. Membership is $4/month, so if you have already donated your membership is currently active and will officially begin on January 1st. I will be sending a PM to everyone whom has this status. Money raised from advertisements and memberships will be used to pay for things like web hosting and other technology, advertisements about YSFlight/HQ, contests/promotions, and other uses that further our mission.

I’ve been trying to get this out the door for some time, but it always got held up because I wanted to write some cool membership-only features first, like the ability to sort your top posts by thanks score, or have more than 1 custom rank on your profile, or a button you could press to slap someone in the face over the Internet. Based on recent feedback, I now realize that we’re going to have to put the cart before the horse: in exchange for becoming a First Class member on YSFHQ, the HQ staff can right now only offer you our undying gratitude and the removal of advertisements, in addition to other benefits listed below. It’s kind of a lame offer, I know, but if the program is a success, we’ll be able to give First Class members better incentives in the coming months. I invite you to post ideas in the comments section; in the meantime, I suppose it’s more or less a pledge drive.

What kind of benefits do First Class members receive?

• Removal of advertisements on all YSFHQ pages
• A custom rank
• Access to the YSFHQ Member’s Lounge (when development begins)
• Their own advertisements on the forum and homepage
• Features you suggest!

Again, I would personally like to thank everyone that has already donated, and ask those who cannot to please consider disabling AdBlock on the site, as this is another way to contribute to the future of YSFHQ.

The YSFHQ Staff have a special Christmas present prepared for the YSFlight community, and we will be announcing that present tomorrow at 00:00GMT, Christmas day. Happy holidays everyone!