I'm sure some of you have been wondering that, even if nobody's come right out and asked it.
But first some background for the new members:
For the past 6 years or so, we have asked you guys to open your wallets and help us get a UPS to keep the site from going down every time the power blips at Brennor's house.
We've done various donation drives (Some of them in this thread: Before I was responsible for terrible banner art, I made an avatar for a new player named Trogdor who donated more than anyone else one month.)
In addition to the donation drives there have been the auctions and raffles at Brencon, where awesome people (most notable MV and JP69) have donated things to be auctioned off.
Over that time, you have donated about $675 above and beyond the costs for the various Brencons. A little over a year ago, Bren announced that the goal for the UPS had been met.
So where's the UPS?
Well, first of all, understand that the UPS we are looking at costs $1100. So just because the
goal has been met doesn't mean it's paid for. Bren has always expected to throw money at it. But we did meet the goal, and B does have enough money set aside to buy it.
The problem is: the one we want isn't available anymore. It's discontinued. The new version has all the same features and costs about the same, but it won't run off of a normal house-power plug (Not even the 240V dryer plug) Getting an electrician in to add the necessary plug adds another $300 or so to the price tag, which puts us back out of range.
But there is good news: The lease terms on the old one that we like will start coming up soon, so they should start hitting the used market, where we can buy them cheaper, replace the batteries, and be good to go.
Alternately, we can try to raise that extra $300.
if you want to donate more:
http://brennor.dyndns.org/rpg/index.php?name=Treasury
As a side-note: The business-class internet connection that Bren uses to keep us running (As well as do his job, watch Netflix, and surf for porn) costs him about 3 times what a normal household high-speed connection does, not to mention the increased electrical bill for running the servers. The other admins have been trying to convince him to take part of that out of the donation money, but he's been fairly devoted to keeping it as a UPS fund.
If he starts getting a significant flow of donations, It'll be easier to convince him to use some. Just sayin'
Hint Hint