Site Supporters, Retailers and Ad Space

[Mantelope]

By popular demand, the ASC Site Supporter program returns!

Love ASC? Check it way more than is healthy? Then send us some cashmoney!

Site Supporters will get a number of benefits:
-Fancy status bar by your avatar
-You can turn off the Google Ads (go into your UserCP then click on Edit Options on the left, then scroll to the bottom.)
-2000 message PM box
-Posting in the trash

The program will operate on a pay-what-you-can basis, but like the last fundraising drive, there will be four tiers:
-Site Supporter - $10
-Silver Member - $25
-Gold Member - $50
-Platinum Member - $100

All sections of the site (excepting the Trash) will remain accessible to everyone regardless of status.

Because all of the costs we face are recurring and not just one-time things, your Site Supporter status will last for one (1) year, from the day you send your donation (or November 1st, if you send it before then).

If you donated in the past, we're going to retain your old level until the start of 2009. Donating any time before then will bump your status all the way to 2010.

We will be accepting donations through EMT and PayPal, at the email address donations@airsoftcanada.com (EMT is preferred). Set the EMT password to 'airsoft' and MAKE SURE you include your exact ASC username in the comments.

The features mentioned above will be activated on November 1st.


PM Box Size

As we have warned previously, the maximum PMs you can store at a time will be going down to 100. This is going to be implemented on November 1st, so YOU NEED TO BACK UP YOUR MESSAGES! Go to your inbox and scroll all the way to the bottom and look on the right: "Download all Private Messages as:"

If you can't stand to go to a smaller PM box, consider becoming a site supporter; you'll keep the 2000 message limit you enjoy now.


Retailers and Ad Space

We're working hard to get the retailers section and the community ad space working. Let me give you some details.

Retailers:
-Retailers will get a thread in the retailers forum; no bumping limits, customers are free to post in your thread to ask questions, and more. We'll be able to set up more custom permissions if you want.
-Updates will appear on the retailers homepage; you can see an example here: http://www.airsoftcanada.com/index.php?page=retailers
-MUCH larger PM box
-Estimated price will be $50/month, and we will offer discounts for multiple months bought in advance

Ads:
-The ad space will be in the upper right, where the ASCA banner used to be
-banner size is 420x89, the same size as the ASC image in the upper left on the Boring Blue theme
-You must be an age-verified user or a retailer to purchase ad space
-Estimated price will be $50/month, similarly with discounts for multiple months bought in advance
-Ads will be rotated between all advertisers
-The actual ad image has to be approved by us

In order for the retailers to get as much visibility as possible, we have decided to make the retailers section visible to everyone, including non-age-verified members. This was not an easy decision to make. We have no intention of allowing anybody to circumvent the age verification system we've worked so hard to implement, so there will be a terms-of-service agreement that retailers must sign onto, stating explicitly: guns and gun parts can only be sold to age-verified members, no ifs, ands or buts. The AV tag is the only thing that will allow purchase of guns and gun parts through any section of this website. We believe this will be beneficial, as it will give a much greater incentive to new members to get age verified, and it won't restrict gear retailers like Army Issue. Selling guns and gun parts to non-AVed members will be reason to have their retailer status and AV status revoked.

Retailers will still have to abide by the rules of the community; they will still have a trader rating, and trade disputes will be dealt with by the admins just like any other seller. We have no plans to leave our users out in the cold.

Due to a recent influx of retailers, we have decided that retailer subscriptions must be pre-approved. All accounts with retailer status will be grandfathered, and can continue subscribing to the program without difficulty. If you wish to become a new retailer, you must email us at ads@airsoftcanada.com to state your intent. Know that at this point, we will not be approving every retailer that applies; please let us know why you feel your presence on ASC will benefit the community. We feel this action will lead to an overall higher quality of retailers on ASC.


A subscriptions page has been added:
http://www.airsoftcanada.com/payments.php

Feel free to use that form to make your donation!

[ujiro]

If I say, donated $25 now, and $25 at a later date, would I receive gold status?

[Mantelope]

Originally Posted by ujiro

If I say, donated $25 now, and $25 at a later date, would I receive gold status?

Good question... I figure each donation lasts 1 full year, and the overlapping period would be the combination of the donations. So if you give $25 now, and $25 on December 1st, you'll be silver for all of November, Gold until November 1st 2009, then silver until December 1st 2009.

[Drache]

Well my donation has already been sent in! Im not the first and I certainly wont be the last lol!

[FOX_111]

Do age verifiers keep their larger PM box? It's very handy to keep track of verified people and upcomming requests.

[KND]

EMT has been sent but forgot to put my ASC to get gold member.

[Cobrajr122]

Other then the obvious bragging rights and price tag, is there any difference between the 4 donation levels?

EMT sent for silver... might upgrade to gold later =D

[Scooby Steve]

EMT sent. Gold baby, gold!

[Mantelope]

Originally Posted by Cobrajr122

Other then the obvious bragging rights and price tag, is there any difference between the 4 donation levels?

No, and we don't intend on introducing anything like that. We're not going to make it so you can only see the buy&sell if you've got Gold, and so on.

[Drache]

so how many donations have you received so far? lol

[Crunchmeister]

My $25 donation has been sent.

[huang]

If I purchase 12 monthes retailer thread, how much discount will I get? And can I not allow people reply in my sales thread since I would like to keep the thead clean and for products only.

cheers
Huang

Oops. this meant to be a PM instead of a post.

[Drache]

I made a donation to this site for three simple reasons:

1) I use the site and it's always been maintained
2) Sort of an apology for acting like an ass a couple months back
3) I know it will be used well!

#3 comes from another forum I was a member of that had a "donation drive" but instead it was by way of selling a $5 t-shirt for $30 (Had the site's logo on it for use with carshows). Let's just say that 3000 of us ordered at LEAST one shirt each and only 100 of us received the shirts. The site was shut down a month later and no one ever heard back from the admin....

So when do we start seeing out new little status bars?

[Mantelope]

Originally Posted by huang

If I purchase 12 monthes retailer thread, how much discount will I get? And can I not allow people reply in my sales thread since I would like to keep the thead clean and for products only.

cheers
Huang

Oops. this meant to be a PM instead of a post.

We have yet to finalize the retailer specifics, but you'll know as soon as we do. Yes, we'd be able to make your thread no-reply.

[Lisa]

Retailers and Advertisers will also be put on a list of site supporters listed in the retailer section.

Age verifiers will also have a larger inbox.