Please become a BCG Supporter

Hello. Thanks for using our forums!

After well over a decade in operation, we're now for the first time asking regular visitors like you if they'd consider becoming a BCG Supporter, donating to help keep the site running: https://www.comedy.co.uk/donate

BCG is expensive to operate and sometimes it's a struggle (for many months, Aaron and I have been paying out of our own pockets to keep the site online). We're now at the point where we need to look at additional routes of funding to continue what we do.

People have asked from time to time in the past if they could donate to our upkeep somehow, but we didn't want to accept without being able to offer something in return. The donation page on the link above details a range of new features and functions we've just launched to do just that: from swish chrome lapel pin badges, to additional data views.

(BCG Supporters also see less adverts, so if you find the top banner advert annoying when browsing these forums, it may be worth donating for that reason alone!)

This isn't just about securing the site's future. We're also aiming to expand what we currently do at the same time too, funding more functionality and creating more things to read/watch/listen to.

Our mission is, and always will be, to celebrate, promote and champion British comedy, and we'd love you to play a part in that. So if you can spare £1 or more, please consider becoming a BCG Supporter and keep the site alive!

We really hope you share our vision for an even better, bigger BCG, and we hope some of the special perks we have to offer will pique your interest too.

Love,
Mark & Aaron

https://www.comedy.co.uk/donate/

Hi Mark/Aaron

I've tried 3 times and each time get an error code saying I need to enter a post code (which I had done on ecah occasion).

I love this place and how everyone has a laugh and a giggle so to donate to the upkeep is a no brainer. It's also obvious how much effort you guys put in and the fact you've been bankrolling it from your own pocket demonstrates the dedication to sharing the life enhancing institution that is Great British comedy.

In a few hours when my salary is avaialble I'll be donating £30 for the year but in the meantime I tested it and after entering my address I was able to get to the card details page using Firefox.

Quote: Definitely Tarby @ 28th March 2018, 9:55 PM

I love this place and how everyone has a laugh and a giggle so to donate to the upkeep is a no brainer. It's also obvious how much effort you guys put in and the fact you've been bankrolling it from your own pocket demonstrates the dedication to sharing the life enhancing institution that is Great British comedy.

In a few hours when my salary is avaialble I'll be donating £30 for the year but in the meantime I tested it and after entering my address I was able to get to the card details page using Firefox.

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I got to the card details page as well, filled it all in and hit the pay button, that's when I got the 'no post code error'.

Quote: Will Cam @ 28th March 2018, 10:12 PM

I got to the card details page as well, filled it all in and hit the pay button, that's when I got the 'no post code error'.

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Not sure why that is happening but maybe it's an issue with the payment company not recognising the postcode or the postcode format.

I just donated £30 with a Visa debit card and it said I'm now a supporter and will get the supporter logo and see fewer ads but there was no kind of online receipt or way to provide an email address to have one emailed to me. It's no big deal but it might be something others want to receive for their records.

Just tried it again, same thing happened. Will try with thee wife's PayPal account tomorrow.

I'm quite ignorant about this sort of thing.

You get advertising. What costs are involved?

Thank you very much to those who have donated already. Evidently a couple of quirks to iron out in the payment process, but everyone now has their Supporter status recorded correctly. Thanks for your perseverance!

Quote: Chappers @ 28th March 2018, 11:17 PM

You get advertising. What costs are involved?

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Server costs, software licences, picture fees... it all adds up to more than banner ads bring in Chappers (you may have seen articles about how banners aren't exactly lucrative for websites).

It's obviously not very British to discuss money, but I will PM you a link to some more specific stuff in the morning

Where does the money go then Aaron? I saw you were looking up a World Tour for next year.

Quote: Chappers @ 28th March 2018, 11:37 PM

Where does the money go then Aaron? I saw you were looking up a World Tour for next year.

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World tour? Not me...

The little that comes in from the advertising you see goes towards covering the costs of keeping the site actually online and operational - it doesn't even meet that 100%. That means just keeping what is already here, here. It doesn't fund us or our time, doesn't allow us to pay other contributors - in short doesn't actually allow the site to keep being updated, but merely to exist.

Could you try the Patreon funding site? It looks interesting - if a little difficult for my aged brain to understand. Dave Cohen & Sitcom Geeks are on it, have you talked to them? https://www.patreon.com/SitcomGeeks

Quote: Mark @ 28th March 2018, 11:36 PM

Server costs, software licences, picture fees... it all adds up to more than banner ads bring in Chappers (you may have seen articles about how banners aren't exactly lucrative for websites).

It's obviously not very British to discuss money, but I will PM you a link to some more specific stuff in the morning

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The 3D Barbara Windsor wallpapers are fantastic and worth it alone.

I know how much the behind the scenes costs can be. Server rental and hosting isn't cheap and firewalls that need to be managed 24/7 and all the other maintence that needs to happen to make sure this rocking place is always available. Most people think you just plug in the server and that's it and mentioning OSI model, TCP IP, and DNS are glazed eyes time Add on top of that how the sites content is always changing which means someone has to update the code and then FTP it to the web server it seems like a large crew run this gaff.

Hosting costs are partly based on disk space used and I don't think this site deletes data so that cost will be going up and up. I'm grateful members have been given the oportunity to to help keep an online community alive instead of closing down which I've experienced before. It was a snooker forum hosted on the BBC sports pages and they pulled the funding to not just snooker but a lot of other sports forums at the time. It was around 2005 and in the impending 'switchoff' members were asking why such popular services were being cut when the costs of running the online forums were low and the members themselves were prepared to fund it.

Quote: Definitely Tarby @ 29th March 2018, 1:15 AM

it seems like a large crew run this gaff.

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If only! We'd love to be creating jobs and employing people. Hopefully donations are the first step towards that.

Quote: playfull @ 29th March 2018, 12:29 AM

Could you try the Patreon funding site? It looks interesting - if a little difficult for my aged brain to understand. Dave Cohen & Sitcom Geeks are on it, have you talked to them? https://www.patreon.com/SitcomGeeks

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Thanks Playfull. We did look into using Patreon as a platform... but, using their technology, we couldn't then tie it in with our login system to give people the benefits like less adverts... so we've essentially built our own platform to do both. That said, if people would prefer to use their existing Patreon login to donate, we are happy to setup a page on there too!