Kanzenshuu 2013 Informal Donation Appeal

[VegettoEX]

You already know what kind of resource Kanzenshuu is. This particular post is on our forum, and if you're reading these words, chances are you spend a good amount of time here. We're glad you have such a great time hanging out with us.

We merged Daizenshuu EX and Kanzentai back on April 1st, 2012. It's been a crazy year since then. Beyond all of our exhaustive-and-exhausting Battle of Gods coverage (news, interview translations, pictures from the premiere), we've continued the weekly podcast, launched new guides ("Animation Styles Guide", anyone?!), updated old ones, and so on and so forth. It's what we do!

It's getting incredibly expensive to do, though.

Daizenshuu EX, up through the merge in 2012, always ran on static HTML pages. It was leftover insanity from a redesign in 2002 that got a few updates here and there, but was never a technological marvel. Kanzentai ran with some minor PHP work, but was pretty much static content pages, as well.

Kanzenshuu is different. There is a bit of dynamic work behind done behind the scenes, and the entire site runs on an actual content management system. It lets us get our job(s) done easier, and it gives you the organization and presentation that's worth delivering in the first place. You now also have a universal login for the entire site -- it's your login to comment on news stories, it's your login for the forum, and it will be your login for the eventual wiki.

The combination of traffic (which obviously took a jump due to Battle of Gods) and -- most importantly -- CPU resources costs money. There's no getting around it. Starting out the year we were paying double what we were paying a year ago, and now we are paying triple. And it's not enough to abide the occasional database errors and/or slowness. Throw a wiki on top of that? With the amount of traffic we get and the amount of work you're all so clearly ready and eager to throw yourselves into?

Fuggedaboutit.

We don't want to put ads on the website. It looks ridiculous, it looks unprofessional, there's concern over legality of (implied, not actual) "profiting" off someone else's intellectual property, etc. Throw ad service exploits into the mix, and it's not even a question for us. We won't do it.

But that means we need your help more than ever.

We have some generous deals in place, but even after that, right now we are running anywhere between $120-160 a month. We are just scraping by in terms of performance, and like I mentioned, tossing a wiki on top of that? We will need to (finally) switch over to an actual dedicated hosting service like a real grown up website. That's going to push us to $200-250 a month. At least. I'm probably delusional on that, 'cuz it'll likely be way more. We should probably be paying that much now if we wanted the site to run as well as it should.

(We're actually big enough that we might need to explore options BEYOND that, too, but that's definitely not until we launch the wiki.)

Do you like anything of what Kanzenshuu provides? It doesn't matter if it's the larger website as a whole, just the forum, or just the podcast -- these costs cover every aspect of us.

We try not to ask. We don't like to ask. We do need your help, though, especially if you want to see the site continuing to grow. Right now we need to cover a few expenses and upgrade what we can offer -- we don't like the slowness or server reboots any more than you do. We can't really say what amount we "need" right now, other than just hopefully covering our regular monthly expenses -- a more formal fundraiser (Kickstarter-esque or otherwise) may come down the road, likely tied in with the launch of the wiki. That's then, but this is now. If we can get this thing self-sustaining, then all the more power to you and us alike.

--> Like what you see? Any little bit helps. We appreciate it. <--

[samuraix123]

Pm'd I hope things turn out okay! I know it must have been hard posting this.

[Saiyan Prince Vegeta]

Oh how can I not donate! It looks like a lot of work was put into typing this up.

[CashmanX]

Donated!

[Kamiccolo9]

I can't donate anything at the moment, but as soon as I can I'll be glad to help out. This site is most definitely worth supporting.

[sailorspazz]

Donated, and Tweeted to encourage others to do the same. I've been coming to this site for many, many years, all the way back to when VegettoEX was just a teen ranting about Funimation It's been amazing to watch the site grow and transform over the years into the greatest English language source of (accurate! fact-checked!) information for this crazy franchise we all love. Both Dragon Ball and the site started as fun little diversions, and both evolved into something even greater than their creators ever could have imagined at the beginning.

Thank you so much for providing this amazing site and community! Without you, we'd probably all be talking about how Gokuu TOTALLY goes Super Saiyan 5 in the new movie, cuz Toriyama is my uncle and he told me so.

[Scarz]

Donated and I'll probably donate a little more when I get the chance. The Kanzenshuu forum is truly one of my favorite sites and I love the community to pieces (oh right, and the site, I love the site too! ) I was more than happy to donate to you guys!

[Slickmasterfunk]

Donated too! Been visiting the site for years and have been a listener of the podcast since #001. Would donate more if I could and will definitely try to donate in the future. Keep up the great work guys!

[Bussani]

I'd like to make a donation, but for some reason the donate button is just taking me to my default paypal page. Am I doing something wrong?

[Saiyan Prince Vegeta]

The same thing happened to me, so I instead clicked the PayPal donate button at the top right of the page, where it has the FB, Twitter, and Google+ pages linked.

Edit: Or is that the thing that's not working for you?

[Bussani]

Nope, that worked! Thanks, man!

[Saiyan Prince Vegeta]

Glad I could help.

[DHM211]

Well, what a good amount to donate? Id be happy to donate if I knew whats a good amount?

[Tzigi]

Donated. I don't have much money so the amount is by no means big but that was about all I could afford.

[VegettoEX]

The generosity is amazing. You're all amazing. Did I mention some of you are amazing?

Not gonna dwell on it or make any more appeal than I already have. Any little amount helps. Tons of people making whatever contribution they can goes an incredibly long way. The plan right now is to pay off what needs to be paid, and create an on-going base to keep paying what we need to pay along with upgrading what we need.

Thank you. Thanks. Thanks so much. THANK YOU.

[dprez]

I absolutely will donate tomorrow. I love this place and appreciate all that is done behind the scenes to keep it up and running. My donation will be in by this time tomorrow! That's a promise!

Edit: Happy to help.

[soulnova]

Donated.

Keep the Dragon Ball goodness coming.

[SsjRavi]

Donated, thanks for the hard work!

[VegettoEX]

Just gonna pop in to say thank you again to everyone. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but the international support did actually surprise me a bit. Really proves our point about DB fandom being global!

Every bit continues to help and secures things going forward. So incredibly grateful. I'm so glad you all find (I guess literal) value in what we do, and we're happy to provide it to you!

[Kamiccolo9]

Done. Sorry it took so long, and I wish I could have done more, but money's been pretty tight lately. Glad to help out though.