COMMENTARY - New! Warped Core PREMIUM BLEND!!! (a.k.a "Shameless plug for money")

I'm cheap. That's why I host this site at Blogspot using Blogger, because they're free. I have free email accounts, free hosted stat trackers, free polls, and am now looking into a free discussion board or commenting system for the site. I am a big fan of the word "free". But with every one of these free services I have, there lurks its premium counterpart but a click away. You will inevitably at some point take a peak at these premium services during the course of your usage of the free model, and be enticed by the new and upgraded features for just a meager few dollars a month. Many of you may even buy into it and shell out the money for the benefits that come with that title of "premium user". While, as I said, I much prefer the word "free", I can see how this model is effective. The people who want something for nothing have the free service, those with too much money to spend get their title of "premium user", and many of the free subscribers may be convinced to upgrade their services later, making the retailer happy. Everybody wins. So I got to thinking, since this model is used on about everything else even remotely related to my blog and seems to work so well, why not incorporate some sort of premium pay model into my blog as well? I gave it a good deal of thought, and have instead only managed to come up with a list of reasons NOT to do this. It'd be too much work to manage subscriptions, I don't really have many visitors to begin with, and I'm sure most of my regular visitors are as cheap as I am and wouldn't pay for it anyways. Oh, and there's also the fact that I have about nothing to offer paying subscribers that would be worth their money. Since I'm a big fan of the word "free" myself, I have a hard time coming up with content or incentives that I feel warrant your money. So while I may have decided that a premium pay model such as this certainly wouldn't work out too well for my blog, I still want people to give me their money. Then I thought, hey, why not just provide people with the opportunity to simply give you their money for no good reason? That's what PayPal is for, right? Enter my PayPal donation link.

Here's another scenario where everybody wins. You still get all of my content for free, and I will continue to maintain the site as I do currently, as I don't seriously expect anyone to actually donate any money to me. But, should you choose to make a donation, you can take pride in the knowledge that you are aiding in the betterment of my humble little blog. How, you ask? Well, for starters, I may one day be able to afford a computer of my own, so I can type my articles from home rather than writing it all at work when I should be working. This will also ensure that I get more work done at work, as it will cut down on the time I have to spend messing with my blog from there, thus decreasing the chances that I get fired and am left with no means with which to update the site at all in the future. With enough donations, I may even be able to afford an internet connection with that new computer, and I would be able to update the site on the weekends, instead of just on weekdays as I do now. Think about it, if I were to post seven days a week instead of a mere five, that would represent a 28.6% increase in new site content per week, all thanks to your donations. But wait, there's more. I often come up with thoughts or ideas throughout the day that would make great posts on my blog, but since I have nothing on which to jot these ideas down on the spot, I often forget them, and what may have become a precious editorial gem is lost to the swiftly flowing sands of time. Your donations could help fund the purchase of a Palm Pilot, so I could not only jot down these thoughts on the fly, but even write entire articles while I am on the go, improving both the quality and quantity on the site. And after that, I could use donations to buy a digital camera, to improve the aesthetic quality of my site with new photos and graphics. Donations would also allow me to buy more toys and games, see more movies, and go more places, giving me a plethora of new topics to write about, ensuring new and exciting content far into the future. So as you can see, if you enjoy my blog, giving me your money is really in your best interest. So donate freely and often! This is the end of my shameless plug.