I Wonder 🤔 Who Would Pay For Café Membership?

MEMBERS' INTEREST MESSAGE

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🌿 HERE'S MY 2¢ ON THIS (I think) ALL IMPORTANT QUESTION 🌿

(A couple'a days ago I sent the following message to the Café owners, sharing it with a fellow member for his input.)

Hey, Guys!

I hope this little note finds you well and prospering,

You may notice or have already received a message that the "Online Writers" page < https://www.writerscafe.org/writers/online/ > has been stuck for about a week … will you, please, fix it for us? 🙏


And, I'd like to thank you for the years of free enjoyment on WritersCafe and all the work and $$ you must have put into it to keep our home-away-from-home alive.


Something I wish you'd consider: we really enjoy the Café's system enough that I think if you made the onsite features fully functional again, the members would be willing to pay a reasonable fee for membership (perhaps, even offering levels of membership [monthly, yearly, lifetime, etc] with basic or increasingly advanced features, and so forth), allowing you to do without so many frustratingly agitating junk ads for income to support the site. Perhaps, with a free or very low cost “Basic” membership with “fundamental” features for those who want a good place to write, share, and learn, who cannot afford a fee but are passionate about writing (like teens, for instance, or the needy).

It might prove useful to send out a note to the members for some feedback on this idea, eh?

Just a hopeful thought shared, but it would be great for now if you can just make the "Online Writers" page functional for us again.

Contact me anytime.

Thanks for the ear! ~ Richard🖌

(fellow member’s response)

I came here originally because it was free. There are many who only come here occasionally, are they willing to pay? What about the people who hardly get any comments, would they want to pay? Is Charlie (someone who never responds) dependable enough to improve the site after all these years? Hmm?

(my reply)

Well, M'Good Pal,

   This is the only free site I've ever served on that had virtually no issues … that is, until they accidentally deleted everyone's writing, and when we came back is when the faux pas glitches began … a little bit here, a little bit there, and so forth … afterwards, the ads began creeping-in.

    Since, a lot of stuff has gone awry, until we're where we are now.

   Who knows what members will go for and what the owners will actually do with a nice enticement to inspire their efforts?

   I think the site's worth saving, because it's basic function is the most user friendly on the internet, but without a try like this (or, something better ... if you, or someone else has anything to offer), or I'd give the Café a year at most before it craters, and quite possibly before that.

   A sensible person realizes no internet site can survive for free; it takes a lot of $$ and effort to keep a site like this up and running, must less what's required to maintain and improve it when required. Every free site I've ever served on has folded … some lasted for many years, but they've all folded, nonetheless.

Ya got a better, more positive idea, M'Friend? : )

(fellow member’s response)

If you bring forth your idea Charlie might ask you to be a monitor. 

(my reply)

That’s no big deal,

   I've been monitor/moderator on a couple of of sites; it can be time-consuming, and become quite complex at times. But, overall, it can be interesting … even entertaining.

INTERESTING INFORMATION

   There is a new ad-free site a few here have recently joined called "Stars Rite" <https://starsrite.com/> you might consider giving a shot. I find it a bit complex to navigate, and some of the features are a bit cumbersome to use, but it has a lot of positive points, too. Still, it's free, the members are friendly, and it's geared toward accommodating the members' needs and enjoyment … they seem to be making functional improvements almost weekly.

   Also, there are a good number of folk who've migrated there from a free site that's just shut-down after many years in service, "Deep Underground" … I joined there in 2004, and was still a member when it cratered.

   Here's an excerpt from their farewell letter to the membership: "Deep Underground Poetry was a poetry and creative writing community founded in 1999. The website ran at this web address from August 2009 until 12th May 2025. DU Poetry was home to over 40,000 members during those 15 years and hosted around half a million creative works (poetry, prose, short stories and spoken word)."

   You can read the entire farewell letter here <https://deepundergroundpoetry.com/> … very interesting, and oh-so relevant to our own current WritersCafé situation.

"PS: please, feel free to pass this along...."

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Author's Note

"MY DEAR LADY & FELLOW MEMBERS"
It would be great to receive your input on this all-important, concerning issue.
✍

PS: Relic also asked < https://www.writerscafe.org/writing/HouseofRelics/2955826/ >
😃

Reviews

[Davidgeo]

According to my unprofessional internet based data... this site makes the owner about 45-65K per year. (based on publicly available analytics and estimated ad sales revenue).

Charlie is not going to paywall this site for less than 45K per year. Divide 45K by 12 (months)... that's 3,750 per month. What would be a fair and non exclusionary monthly fee? 3 dollars per month? We would need somehting like like 1,250 users willing to cough up 3 dollars every month. Cut that in half... even then, no way we are going to find 625 users willing to submit their cc info and 1.50 a month. Unless Charlie decides to take a paycut... this site will never be paywalled.

[Richard&#128396;]

Thank you again, Davidgeo, for your input 🙏

Note that I've added some "INTERESTING INFORMATION" to this post you might find useful.

[Davidgeo]

This site is going to be around for a while, it's passive income. I don't think Charlie is totally absentee from this site either. The reason why the "online writer" tab is frozen probably has to do with bots. DUP was an entirely different scenario, the online enviroment is much different now. Even sites like these will make positive cash flow with basically no effort and a pretty small hosting fee. This site isn't going anywhere, but, it's not going to improve unless there is a cultural shift in entertainment consumption. It's not financially rational to do anything with this site other than maintain the absolute basics. Did you know that in the first issue of The Scientific American there were three random poems they stuck in there as if they were "articles" because poetry was very, very popular at that time... 1845, august 28th. Man no one cares about poetry or non pop creative writing anymore. I think we are lucky that a site like this seems to be relatively self sustainable. There is only very basic moderation here, this place is like a time capsule in a way. You can pretty much post whatever you want. That's rare for sites like these. We are actually a very civil community considering there is no actual moderator on this site.

[Davidgeo]

Most of us are civil anyway. I'm only civil sometimes.

[Neha agrawal]

I understand the concerns everyone’s raising about the current state of Writers Café. But I joined — and grew to love — this site because it’s a free platform for writers. These days, it feels like almost every site is asking for money, and it’s just not realistic to keep up with all those fees month after month.

It’s not that I can’t pay — I can. But the real question is: where do we draw the line? If every site starts charging, how are we supposed to support them all? Platforms like Writers Café give us a space to write, share, and enjoy without worrying about costs. That’s something worth holding on to.

[Richard&#128396;]

Thank you, Neha, for your input 🙏

Note that I've added some "INTERESTING INFORMATION" to this post you might find useful.

[Relic]

It's an idea worth looking into Richard. We all know we love this site, but measures (whatever they turn out to be) must be taken if WC is to survive. As a moderator - if you so choose to be - it would be nice to see the writers online page cleaned out of pornographic pictures our young writers are exposed to.

However, if the owner does not show any interest and does not assure us we can improve the site, this may all be for naught. The ball is in his court.

[Richard&#128396;]

Thank you, Tim, for your input 🙏

Note that I've added some "INTERESTING INFORMATION" to this post you might find useful.

[Relic]

I like the new info, Richard. Stars rite is relatively new and will take a bit to run up to par but the mod there is much more responsible, visible, and available to the needs of writers.