It's clear that this year, the fundraiser could easily raise much more
than the revenue goals, thanks to dramatic increases in banner
effectiveness. It probably wouldn't even "cost" that much in terms of
annoying readers -- not like ~2 months of 100% banners from previous
years.
While true; I've been trawling around the web reading articles about our
fundraiser and though the articles have mostly been positive I have read
several that are substantially negative. What's even more worrying is the
number of comments on all the articles I've read which are starting to have
a tone that we're misrepresenting what we're doing, that we're misspending
the money, and even more concerning to me, that we already have more than
enough money and that we're turning into a glutton.
It's hard to find effective and responsible
ways to spend that much donor money, but I guess now
is the time to
start thinking more ambitiously about future budgets.
I think it might also be time to begin to rethink about how to responsibly
fundraise -- we've moved far beyond needing money just for servers which is
the message we've left a lot of donors with in previous years. Zack and
Megan have made a good start with moving this perception but there's still
shaping left to be done. Until we do move it though, because of the
sentiment I've been seeing I feel like we should be extra careful --
especially in the arena of raising extra money that we do not already have
allocated and approved.
~Matt Walker