Originally posted by Mikey
This post brings to light one of the many problems that CoasterCrazy has as a operating site, and as a theme park enthusiast community as a whole. While we are held together by a common bond for all things theme park related, and more appropriately our coaster designs and desire to share them amongst each other. We are crippled by our user base, which is formed primary of users aged 13-19. An age range which makes it incredibly difficult to build a community upon because they do not yet have a firm understanding of what a community is or the financial and communal resources that ultimately are needed to make them thrive.
CoasterCrazy was founded in 2002, and next year we will celebrate its ten year anniversary. But while we are one of the oldest sites out there, we have yet to have one community trip, park meeting, or other non-virtual event worthy of us being called anything other then an online forum. We have virtually no income to support the community, aside from a few of our dedicated members, we have as of late, received very little in way of alternative contributions (eg, trip reports, videos, articles, etc) to the site. The majority of our current 13-19 aged user base lacks the financial resources to to provide any monetary support for the community, or to pay for trips or meetings. This has ultimately crippled our chances to continue any further market growth and remain competitive with other sites out there in the market place.
As Oscar has stated previously and I will reincorporate again, we have pumped thousands of dollars into collocation, hardware, software, time, transportation, etc to keep this community alive. I too have an equal investment in this site, and even when Oscar is unable to continue to pay for the site, I have from time to time used the resources of my consulting company to pay the bills. You will find that not once have I questioned paying for this site, simply put, I did it for our loyal users, and because I believe that we do what we must because we can.
We have asked for nothing in return for the free service that we wholeheartedly provide to you, even after we have made some adjustments to lower the overall delivery and operating cost for each free user by limiting some advanced features exclusively to premium members, you still have retained a basic access right to the site. When you get older you will find that you often get what you pay for, and that nothing in life is free.
The fact that it has taken you over a year to learn of our download limit shows me that you are not a very active or constructive member here, that you would rather complain publicly about limitations on a service in which you receive for free, and on someone else's time and dime to boot. Perhaps when you get a little older and a little wiser you will learn about your fallacy, look back on this and reflect.
If you think in anyway that your post here will create some mass exodus or revolt of our user base, or in anyway lesson or take away from the site in anyway, you will likely soon find out that you are the lone ranger in a glass house. Your failures and lack of contribution has in essence also contributed to the communities failures, and now you are feeling the long term effects of that shortcoming.
Personally, I have not given up on CoasterCrazy. For me this site was the the ultimate tool in a three year fight to lead a share holder revolt and ultimately gain back control of the things that mattered most to me. While I have taken a full time position on top of my consulting duties, I still find time to come to this site, and to see what has developed over night. I did not give up on Six Flags and I will not give up on CoasterCrazy. So take this site as you will, and should you decide to not come back, you aren't going to hurt my feelings. But please, for your safety, please don't let the door hit you on the way out. I really hate filling out insurance paper work on stupid people.
- Mikey
Nicely said.
This is why Oscar has to do what he has to do. To keep up a site now days you have to put the site in the eyes of the paying. The site I mod on at start up only had 4 areas to post on. To get more folks interested we added areas like PC hardware,news and such.