I want to offer my two cents on a growing trend of soliciting donations from weblog readers. Some sites out there have a discreet little paypal, or amazon button where readers can donate money to "the cause", while other sites openly and shamelessly solicit donations. While I won't mention any names, I hear that this has been somewhat lucrative for some people. Now, I don't really see anything wrong with this practice. Basically, I am a strong believer in capitalism, and I think that people should earn whatever money they can. If you are providing someone a benefit, be it entertaining conversation, political rants, or whatever, and they are willing to freely stuff a few bucks into your tip jar that is just fine with me. However, don't look for any tip jars to be popping up on my site any time soon.

First, I feel that accepting tips from people, would morally obligate me to continue doing what I'm doing, day in and day out. While I have no plans to quit publishing and maintaining my weblog, I want the freedom to just say "screw it" one day and chuck the whole thing. Had I accepted $20, $10, $5 or even $1 donations from readers, I would feel ever so guilty about packing it in one day. I'd feel as though I were somehow indebted to those loyal readers. Second, I feel this would also obligate me to be entertaining. While I try to be somewhat amusing, (sometimes with miserable results) I don't want anyone paying me any money, and not feeling they got value for what they paid for. So, by refusing donations I have the freedom to be both boring, and lazy.

Also, I think that some people don't understand just what it costs to run a weblog. My biggest investment is time, and since most everything is automated, I don't really spend much time updating it. Typically, I don't write more than a few paragraphs, and it doesn't take much time to do even that. As for the monetary investment, it is only a few hundred dollars a year. In fact, I could run this entire site for free, but chose not to. Having my own domain name cost about $12 a year, and hosting it is another $60. I could easily eliminate both of these costs by dumping the domain name and going to a free ad-based host. I don't do this, because I like the speed, reliability, and flexibility of a private host. Subscribing to Blogger Pro only cost $35, and even they have a free option.

Weblogging for me is strictly a hobby. I have gainful employment, and I do ok for myself, so don't expect me to be begging for bucks any time soon. For now, I'll pay the $107 a year, and devote a little time and effort, and keep this a donation and advertising free area. I will continue providing mediocre content to the masses free of charge. And remember that if you don't like the content that I publish here, you are simply getting what you paid for.