Interesting you say that today.... I have mixed emotions on Fauna and the BOI. I am currently spending $1 a day on advertising there which hasn't really proven to be a productive way to spend $1 a day. I figured since nobody else is doing the new sponsor thing for the BOI specifically (besides Serpenco, which is owned by the same guy as Fauna), that I would do that for an additional $1 a day. Just last night, I started making up a little banner for it, and when I went to log into the BOI to see what color the background was, I had apparently lost my access to that forum (probably because I'm not a paying member, just a paying advertiser). He must have just changed something in the past 2 days, because I haven't been a paying member for a few years now, but could always access the forum. So I'm paying essentially $365 a year in advertising there (and was about to double that), but can't access the only useful forum there because I haven't paid a $25 membership fee? At the same time, he has now lost the $1 a day that I am currently paying, since I'm not going to renew the sponsorship account when it's empty in a week on a forum that I can't access.
About a year ago, I was trying to get my "Good Guy Certification" edited, to have a different phone number or something, and because I asked, he realized I wasn't a paying member, and revoked my "Good Guy Certification." So basically, you have to pay him a membership fee so that you can put his link on your own site, and send people to his site.... Kinda seems like it should be the other way around. I wasn't going to pay him to put his link on my site.
When they were doing the "Fauna Fund Auctions" a few years back, I donated more than probably any other single vendor and the money raised went directly to support Fauna.
It's been a great forum to have and has saved me and countless other people a great deal of trouble by being able to research people before we buy from them. He has been complaining about money for years now, though, and blocking access for people isn't going to force them to pay a membership fee. He tried that a few years back and it didn't work. There's really no benefit of being a paid member if the forum is going to stay open for the non paying members (you should only be able to sell on there if you're a paying member, for starters, which would get me to pay because there would be less classified competition). If he cuts access for non paying members to the BOI, it just won't be used enough.
Wouldn't hurt if he made an appearance in Daytona handing out free t-shirts or flyers to build up traffic like Kingsnake does and Reptster did. There is zero advertising of Fauna besides word of mouth.
(Sorry, Lisa, didn't mean to contradict your post! I'm just financially frustrated with Fauna right now!)
There are several sides to every story, and you see one that most people don't by being a sponsor on that site.
