Danbooru and subscriptions

albert said:
After doing some stats, here are the fav counts for basic users. Percentage of total users given in parens.

0: 47868 (92.2%)
1..100: 4094 (7.8%)
100..200: 366 (0.7%)
200..300: 147 (0.3%)
300..400: 83 (0.2%)
400..500: 56 (0.1%)
500..1000: 143 (0.3%)
1000+: 159 (0.3%)

Since it's so skewed to one side because of the sheer number of 0 favorite users, I think this distribution would be a lot more significant if you removed that outlier. The new percentages would look more like...

1...100: 81.1%
101...200: 7.3%
201...300: 2.9%
301...400: 1.6%
401...500: 1.1%
501...1000: 2.8%
1000+ : 3.2%

Just bored :V

MM23 said: Then stop ignoring posts by non-privileged users on purpose then reuploading them later.

And I've never done this, so don't bitch to me about it.

If a couple paid users end up submitting loads of shit, take away their unmoderated post privileges. Otherwise, don't punish the entirety of the userbase simply because of the actions of a few. It's unjustified and a pretty fucking prick thing to do.

Find another site then, without all those "fucking pricks". The last time we had completely unmoderated uploads on danbooru it became such a pile of shit that it contributed to albert's decision to shut the site down entirely.

And it's not "a few" who upload crap. When I check the mod queue, it's a minority that upload good stuff.

The idea behind limiting favorites is to encourage heavy users to buy a subscription, right? But are we sure those with the most favorites are also the heaviest users? There's a whole bunch of people who have a different usage pattern, where they seldom favorite things even though they browse danbooru all the time. It might be better to concentrate on something most heavy users want, such as access to explicit posts.

Question: If in case this system of subscriptions gets implemented, especially in regards to paying for a privileged status, will those who are already privileged members pay as well? Or are those who are already privileged members exempted from paying anything?

The two things that really get me are the first 10 page useage and the 100 favorites. I really hope it doesn't get to that.

I love the site, and I'm starting to contribute more, but right now I'm in no way able to pay for the access and that really bothers me.

I hope something can be sorted out without haveing to go to this plan :/

LaC said:
The idea behind limiting favorites is to encourage heavy users to buy a subscription, right? But are we sure those with the most favorites are also the heaviest users? There's a whole bunch of people who have a different usage pattern, where they seldom favorite things even though they browse danbooru all the time. It might be better to concentrate on something most heavy users want, such as access to explicit posts.

I think the biggest hurdle is to somehow provide enough incentive for people to contribute to danbooru while not gimping it enough that it seems like you're strong-arming people into paying to use danbooru. With the idea of limiting favorites, this may not be enough of an incentive to have people contribute, but removing explicit images might make it seem like you're trying to sell that content, content which danbooru doesn't own, which is kinda shady.

Limiting to the first 10 pages is pretty limited, but i think perhaps along the right idea however. It's kinda like, danbooru is this huge archive of images from past to present, and that's how i kinda see it as its purpose, so I think that since that's its biggest draw, limiting that feature would be the best route without making it seem like you're selling specific content such as removing explicit images. Maybe expand the page limit from 10 to 100 (which seems totally reasonable considering there's something like 17,000 pages total), or images that are only up to x number of months old, and if you want to access older archives you'd need to contribute. I dunno if this would alleviate any server pressure though, since I don't know if most of the viewing goes towards the newest posts or a combination of all the new and old, especially when doing searches.

Well, ideally, none of this would have to be implemented, and people would just contribute freely, without albert having to beg for it or change the way danbooru works.

nanami said: Question: If in case this system of subscriptions gets implemented, especially in regards to paying for a privileged status, will those who are already privileged members pay as well? Or are those who are already privileged members exempted from paying anything?

Albert has indicated that the 'free' path to privileged (merit) will be maintained. This would naturally extend to anyone who has been invited already.

Don't limit favorites, I'll say it again .
It's the only privilege from a member account that directly benefits the user, if it doesn't exist there's no point in even registering for an account.
Why would a user start tagging or uploading if he's not getting anything in return anymore? Just save the images you want and see them on your large unsorted untagged misc anime images folder which you probably won't go through any time soon, just like you would in an imageboard.
Why would you consider this anyway? Is a user seeing his favorites that taxing on the server? The average user doesn't have Endless Danbooru Pages, so he still has to see it page by page, and 'take it easy' limits his use right there doesn't it?
And these stats...

albert said:
0: 47868 (92.2%)
1..100: 4094 (7.8%)
100..200: 366 (0.7%)
200..300: 147 (0.3%)
300..400: 83 (0.2%)
400..500: 56 (0.1%)
500..1000: 143 (0.3%)
1000+: 159 (0.3%)

It's not "it's okay to limit favorites because most people don't use that many anyway" but instead "if so few people use favorites that much, why limit them?". Limiting favorites is basically saying "So you like to use the site a lot, eh? Well fuck you, you should have been a more casual user and saved the pictures you liked and see them on your computer. Danbooru isn't your image sorter."
Another thing that really gets me is that, usually when you decide to have a pay option on a website, you shouldn't take features from the regular users and make them privileges of the paying members only, rather, you make new features that would make people want to pay rather than just forcing them to pay. Personally, not getting 'take it easy' seems like enough of an incentive for users who are willing to pay. The large majority however, would be non-paying users so you can't just dismiss them as freeloaders.
But aside from all this, will limiting favorites really be worth the trouble? Is it really worth forcing the users to make multiple accounts and abuse the pools and generally disrupting the current stability of the site? This tradeoff seems bad no matter how I look at it.

If the objetive of this move is to reduce the number of members (privileged or not) to get more free space for the new posts, then reducing the pages of visible images can be a problem. New basic members could upload material already posted, and even if this is not a new problem, the server can be saturated with old stuff.

Sorry about the bad English.

I think you should use paypal for payment because people from other countries than america don´t have a credit card. You would also save the 30$/month.

IIRC Paypal will take your money and run if they find out you do adult stuff, so it's a no go on Paypal.

surasshu said: IIRC Paypal will take your money and run if they find out you do adult stuff, so it's a no go on Paypal.

And the amount they rape you on fees would probably be almost as bad as the CC services.

I've pretty much ignored this thread, and haven't read much of it. I also don't really know much about how much ads do as far as making money from a site, but this is just an idea I have based on how I assume it works:

If you're having trouble paying for Danbooru, why not just put up more ads? People don't like ads, but I bet the regular members would be a lot more happy with more ads than with having to pay to see more than 10 pages.

I do think that being able to pay for priv accounts is a good idea though, so those who want to see loli/shota can do so even if they have nothing to contribute to db.

albert would you mind making a summary post of everything you are currently planning on doing if this system comes into play? It looks to have morphed so much since the initial post I'm kind of confused as to what's going on anymore.

I don't think anything will change. I think this is all just a phase and it will go away after awhile.

At least that's what I hope.

You could try and keep ads around and charge people to not have to look at them. I think a one time $20 dollar fee would be well worth it to a lot of people to not see ads any more...

But I suppose the problem there is that loli and shota tagged pics are hidden because they scare advertisers, so under such a system, loli/shota would remain hidden to keep advertisers, and thus people who paid would be getting loli/shota and no ads, which creates the implication that people are paying specifically the loli/shota art on danbooru, (which would be true for some, I'm sure) and that _might_ be troublesome because danbooru, of course, doesn't own the art.

dragnfly said:
I had a look at some of my stats. If it's 20 per page, then I have 75 favs.

You currently have 85 favourites. It's on your profile.

surasshu said:
IIRC Paypal will take your money and run if they find out you do adult stuff, so it's a no go on Paypal.

I do seem to remember another image site putting up a message that they had to remove the Paypal donation button.

I would pay the money if I didn't have to see the ads anymore. Sorry, but I really don't like seeing boobs'n'butts when I am looking up chibi and such. (But I understand they pay for server costs!) I use Danbooru because I enjoy looking at pretty pictures and to find references when I draw.

So a one time payment of $20 sounds rather fair to get no ads atleast. AND, if people don't like using their credit cards, a very good alternative would be get one of those credit card gift cards. They can be charged like a credit card, and there isn't there isn't a paper trail (for those who worry,) right?

Using #4585 as the basis which privileged accounts are defined, I don't think that paying justifies people getting having no upload limit or bypassing mod approval only because people may post spam. Maybe a higher upload limit and uploads at the top of the approval queue would be fair. After all privileged account is gained through merit and if that people worked for it, they can be trusted to be responsible.

By the way, is it necessary to limit favorites? I admit I am one of the .3% that I have over 1000 favs, but I don't go through them often, so I don't eat up a ton bandwidth by going through them ><; I just happen to like a lot of pictures...

What I'm going to do:

- I'll open a PO box and ask for checks/money orders if you want to upgrade your account to privileged status. The fee will be a one time $20. I will not accept credit cards unless enough people ask.
- The only differences will be not seeing the 503 page, not seeing ads, and the ability to search more than two tags at a time.
- Privileged accounts will still have their uploads subject to moderation.
- Moderators will be able to promote anyone to privileged or contributor status.

None of this will be going into effect anytime soon; I'm waiting to hear back from some sponsors and a potential server migration. You'll probably hear updates two or three weeks from now.

Well at least we still have some time before things take effect. Thanks for the info.

And the "Regular users are limited to the first 10 pages and only 100 favourites", does that still stand?

I'm just wondering if favourites will be wiped for regular users if that happens then. I might have to start saving stuff rather than favouriting them.