Freak Republic forced to defend donations - quote Skinner?

After internal complaints about Freak Republics lousy site and never ending calls for donations, JimRob´s offspring John, is forced to try and explain where all the money goes.

and quotes non other than the owner of DU, our Skinner..

How strange? Does this means that Skinner holds more credibility to Freak Republic users than their own owner and admin?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1497498/posts

He accounts for their hardware, their bandwidth, and all of the network maintenance, padding the figures as best he can, AND HE STILL LEAVES 51,900 PER QUARTER UNACCOUNTED FOR. Everything needed to run the site is paid for with less than a third of what they claim they need. The rest goes........ well who knows. Nice RV JimRob has though huh?

Oh and by the way John? If I were you I wouldn't want to claim responsibility for FR's software. The site will die someday and you will be looking for a job. Having that archaic mess on your resume is not going to impress anyone. Seriously dude, it's time to join the 21st century. Your "software" looks a bare step up from Telnet. I could design better from scratch on a hungover Sunday afternoon, and do it for far less than your 48k annual fee. You suck at the internet.

From their budget: https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/budget

Bandwidth and Colocation $2,700
System Administation and Programming 4,000
Administrative and Taxes 9,500
Legal and Accounting 1,000
Bank Fees, Credit Card Fees, Processing Fees 800
Equip, Maintenance and Repairs 300
Office Expenses, Rents, Insurance, Telephone, ISP, Supplies, Misc. 2,500
Travel Expenses 800 21,600.00

Bandwidth & loc, plus bank fees, plus equip is 3,800. Legal and accounting? Well, I'll give them that, and that's 4,800.

Now, they're paying system administration 4,000, taking 800 for travel (to run a blog?), mixing administrative with taxes for 9,500, and throwing "misc" in with office, rent, telephone and insurance (ISP is already covered by bandwidth & colo).

So, they're getting $21,500/month, and paying taxes on an otherwise 4,800 bill. Let's go crazy and say that's $500 of it, so that's around $21k left to work with. It doesn't take much of an office to run a blog (his equipment is in the colo). I can run one from my bedroom (and do, in fact). Just for kicks, say he's shelling out a thousand for an office, though I can't imagine why. That's still 20k/month to work with. Whoa. Telephone, office supplies, insurance (on an office that just runs a blog?). Say a hundred each for tele & office supplies, and a wild 100 for monthly office insurance, for whatever reason. Throw in a few hundred more for misc stuff, and you've still got $19,000 a month in System Administration and Programming, Administrative, Misc., and travel.

Who is it that's getting paid $19,000 or more per MONTH, to do administrative work for a weblog? It sounds like he's dodging the problem of admitting that the owner is paying himself a salary of at least $228,000 a year for this thing.

You can't tell me there's a quarter million a year in Misc expenses to run a blog.

That is not a good practice, unless they don't have the money, and then it's an even worse practice.

They're probably talking about payments for processing the donations. To take credit cards, they either need to contract with a merchant bank, or at least get an account set up with their ISP (though that should be covered in either of the previous times they accounted for it, once for bandwidth/colo and once for ISP). But the expense itself is legit (though accounting for it three times may not be).

Either way, the administrative (and programing - which is a laugh) expense is almost all of the money they're taking in. I bet that big "tax" bill he mentioned was "income tax".

They are quarterly, not monthly.

There must be vibes in the air tonight. (I used to call them Freep's since learning about them here, but tonight, Freak Republic came to my mind). Hopefully, they are dust in the wind! Is it a full moon?

to run such an antediluvian site. It looks like something straight out of the early 1990s, and all the freepers can do is gush about how great it is. :eyes:

It's a SCAM, and RimJob is putting
alot more cash into his pocket than
he is spending on that out-of-date site.

A good IT person could duplicate that site
for very little money, using equipment
and software that modern sites tossed
into their dumpsters.

To paraphrase a line from "Futurama",
FR is the website equivalent of
a prom dress stapled together from old carpet samples.

That explains a lot!

mikey_the_rat

PS
I tried posting this with a Niblonian accent -- did it come through?

honest about expenses, fees, and compensation, I'm pretty sure they would be excommunicated from the junior capitalists club. :smoke:

all the freeper lurker assholes here must see for themselves how superior DU is - they have to

That's why they go back and proclaim the superiority of their dump--to try to assuage their cognitive dissonance.

and have voiced my opinion many times over the quality of DU as opposed to "IT" as recent as yesterday;
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4968837#4978978
There is an amazing difference between the two sites. DU continue to sink money BACK INTO DU, unlike "IT" that seems to skim every penny it can from their users. Just LOOK at the pitiful site, the format was designed in the late nineties or early eighties and hasn't changed one iota since. What new features have been added to "IT" over the years? (crickets chirping) There's rumor that RimJob bought a new motor-home with "IT'S" proceeds so he could travel around the country in style from propaganda rally to propaganda rally (with all 50 or so active members attending) and other "official "IT" business :eyes:
RimJob's son hasn't said one thing that people don't or shouldn't know, but where is the REST of the money going that "IT" collects?
The difference between DU and "IT" is black and white. "IT'S" members SHOULD be asking questions, they're being fleeced and then being asked to enjoy it. "IT" is a joke, a way for RimJob and his "consultant" son (and how many MORE family members) to rob from their faithful while giving the bare minimum in return. :rofl: Which proves what IDIOTS these people are! :rofl:

will benefit. This RV is a useful tool, until, and I think it is coming on, they get caught, they will keep doing it.

And, you all think 2-4000.00 donators care about where the money is going? Not! Until, they get indicted too!

Last night on Nightline, TK interviewed a preacher, who was looking to gain 2 million for his endeavors in the Gulf. His experience was running a kids camp, (providing logistics for the NG, housing, food prep., etc.).

I think the Bush Admin. just showed the military what they think of them, zilch, (except for the bribed, % wise minimum!). The BA are too stupid, to know how stupid their decisions are, because, yes man is kissing my ass.

the freeps themselves would get a little tired of that crappy site after a while and start asking questions like "where the hell is all the money going, it sure isn't going back into the site"? I don't know, maybe I'm giving them too much credit in the curiosity department. They AREN'T that intellectually curious, that's quite obvious from their politics.

It's like televangelism -- don't ask questions, just keep sending in your donations.

Here's one of my all-time fave movie quotes, from Max Von Sydow's character Frederick from Hannah and her Sisters, on the vapidness of television:

"But the worst are the televangelists. Third-rate con-men who tell the poor suckers who watch that they speak for Jeeeezus; and always send money -- money! money! money! If Jesus Christ ever came back and saw what was going on in His name, he'd never stop throwing up."

mikey_the_rat

not "eighties". I'm a stickler for detail and it's too late to edit. No biggie, I guess I'm a little anal retentive.

in JimRob's private porta-potty..

RimJob's newest version of the "Freepbeep 2005"

http://www.ee.ryerson.ca:8080/~elf/abacus/images/tnlao.jpg

Any questions? Any dullard (except a freep I guess) can see the difference between a professionally run and maintained web-site and what the freeps pass off as one. That site is pitiful, always has been. The format is as easy to navigate as a bathtub with a towel for a sail. That those "morans" can't notice the difference between a modern, cutting edge of technology site and their pitiful stone-age excuse for a site speaks volumes about their intelligence and just how little in life they're willing to settle for.

DU RULES, fr drools!

I'd liken the "new" FreepBeep more along the lines of a Speak-n-Spell. An old, broken Speak-n-Spell you got for 25 cents at a garage sale ('cuz it's all messed up and the cow says "Meow").

mikey_the_rat

Seems everything the repukes touch is corrupted.

Oh, my eyes, my eyes...

No, not the layout, or even the viewpoints... I immediately encountered the major reason I stay away from there; the poor spelling and syntax.

JimRob, would it be too much to ask for to spell Jim Baker's name correctly? It appears that the rest of the post, while clumsily written at times, was at least spell-checked. This seems to make it better than most posts from there I randomly sample from time to time. I'm not a perfect writer myself, but then again, I'm not justifying $48K a year for a 30 hour/week job.

Meh... that's 5 minutes of my life I won't get back now.

Of Jim and Tammy Faye fame.

Excuse me, I have this size 10 boot to get out of my mouth....

:blush:

Send your money to the Lord, But make the check out to me. same old shit just a different package.

ha ha, thanks for the laugh...

Democrat Party because then it ends in "rat" and they think that's hilarious. :eyes: Small things amuse small minds.

want to further the agenda, they are not like us. (They actually have money to piss away, now when they are judged is a different story) I truly believe they actually got the laundering down to an art, excuse me, Tom Daly.

It really is going to get curious how many people the WH has to distance themselves from. I think the MSM smells blood and if they don't cover it, they will bleed out.

And do you know how much cash it takes to gas-up an RV these days? /snarkiness

overtly insulting him. I don't get it, this isn't right. They must be preparing something big against DU. :tinfoilhat:

Quick we must launch Project X!

the 2002 FR looks better laid out and actually has some graphics:

http://web.archive.org/web/20020607225042/http://freerepublic.com/index.html

Teh little fweepers can't get their precious tax exemption because they engage in political activity, they're OMG persecuted!!1!, awww, call the waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahmbulance:cry:

Instead of dumping more into FR, they're dumping less! :rofl: Those poor freepers. They don't even know they're being taken so rimjob can live in style while they continue mopping the floors at McDonalds.

The Freeps were all freaked out by the changes and John was forced to put everything back to the way it was.

He actually started to make some nice improvements to make the site easier to navigate.

shit they have now.

THAT IS TOTALLY PATHETIC.

:cry: :rofl:

Have they ever been audited?

Just thinking....they have no problem screwing each other - why would Rimjob reveal ALL the donations?

:rofl:

Even if I were a Bush-bot, I wouldn't waste my time there.

and I have to think he knows something about running a really big site that I don't.

But I disagree in that I don't think FR is as big as the Alexa numbers makes it out to be relative to other sites like this one.

Please keep this kicked for Ben Burch. :D

Love ya Ben! :loveya:

:yourock:

How can they be so stupid ?

getting screwed over. That should answer your question.

sucks like sucking big Cheney.....!:puke:

They're ranked around 1,300 in Alexa. For the record, Homestar Runner is around 1,600, Fark is ranked around 1,100, and like it or not... we're ranked around 3,300-3,600. That's in most visited English language web sites on the Internet. Our numbers are very good, but Free Republic gets a MASSIVE amount of traffic, almost as much as fark.com. That sort of traffic needs a colo'ed server with a lot of space, a lot of support, and a LOT of bandwidth. More than the basic stats of the server, the space, and the bandwidth, the support and location is a big thing. A dedicated server in a NOC that can support the simultaneous (not monthly) bandwidth that a site like Free Republic requires is very expensive. I don't know if it's $22,000/month expensive, but it's not something that can be supported by a $500/month site hosting deal.

That said, it's still a site full of a bunch of fucking scary twits and it disturbs me greatly that they seem to outnumber us.

On edit:

Also on that said, I have a feeling that JimRob-BillyBob skims a wee bit off the donations to support himself on his followers.

-

Why does anyone here care about the intracicies of FR's fund raising operations and monthy bills? Were you planning on donating?

Funny enough, it's the same question I wondered about FR users when they were trying to derail the fundraiser for Andy.

As much as I disagree with his politics, he makes some valid points.

Free Republic is HUGE, in terms of traffic, in terms of users, etc.

Just because it doesn't look pretty, don't think it can be ran on a 486 with a 56k connection. There are times when the sight gets mainstream media attention.

Can you imagine how high traffic spiked over there during the "Memogate" scandal? A DSL line isn't exactly going to support that.

Also, the guy deserves to be paid. This isn't some hobby of his, it's his job. He's worked hard to create that slathering den of misinformation, he deserves to make a buck from it.

To get an Alexa hit, your site must be visited by an Alexa Toolbar user.

Alexa Toolbar only runs under MS Internet Explorer for Windows.

Now consider: DU is full of Mac users, Windows users running Firefox, Linux users and MSIE Windows users who know Alexa is spyware. None of us will show up in Alexa's stats. Besides, the average DUer knows Alexa is freepable.

Freepers, OTOH, are proud of their Alexa rating and probably encourage new Freepers to install the Alexa Toolbar.

He probably is running 10MBps, but how much of that is DUers going over there to laugh at their shit?

It gets its figures by analyzing the number of people who visit a website who have the Alexa toolbar installed. Furthermore FR ran an Alexa ad on it's website for a good long time, presumably to help pad that number. There are a lot of sites that have ridiculous Alexa ratings, primarily because their typical users are smart enough to not install Alexa's spybar on their system.

BTW that 22k a month is all administrative cost. The server etc is already covered.

I really doubt their claim of 2-3 million page hits a day. I suspect they are puffing up their numbers by usings a few PC's to continually reload their frontpage. I see the same people posting over and over. If their turnout in DC 2 weeks ago is any indication, I think they probably get 1/10 of the numbers they claim.

Except for the very stupid, who'd go their to read their collective opinion on anything? For every thoughtful statement posted, you have to plow through 100 idiotic and incoherent posts. Processing nonsense gives me a headache.

"To: John Robinson
Being that this post will be read by the detractors who infest such sites as LP,FU,CP and DU I wish to convey a personal message: you folks are the biggest bunch of deluded dirtbag busy bodies on the internet.

Take your whiny, foul-mouthed, snot-nosed AF attitudes and kiss my arse you pathetic zeros.
113 posted on 10/06/2005 3:46:11 AM PDT by Rebelbase (Jim Robinson is the Ayatollah of Political Jihad)
< Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies >"

Edit:

This says it all:

"To: John Robinson

I'm delighted to pay my 20 bucks a month, don't care how much it costs as long as it keeps going as long as it keeps going, and I hope Jim makes a big fat profit from it and lives very comfortably.

165 posted on 10/06/2005 5:45:20 AM PDT by T Minus Four (Some assembly required.)
< Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies >"

"To: John Robinson
I am constantly amazed by the software on this site.

Good job!
193 posted on 10/06/2005 8:44:03 AM PDT by Coyoteman (I love the sound of beta decay in the morning!)
< Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies >"

To: Jim Robinson; John Robinson
We are preparing for FR phase II.

Shouldn't that be FR Phase V? I seem to recall 4 major Forum rewrites.

That 20,000-volt machine ought to make a nice difference too :-)
224 posted on 10/06/2005 11:49:04 AM PDT by steveegg (The quarterly FReepathon is the price you pay for FR...until enough people become monthlies!)
< Post Reply | Private Reply | To 68 | View Replies >

:rofl:

Let's just keep up the good work. :evilgrin:

"and I hope Jim makes a big fat profit from it and lives very comfortably."

The reason the repubs steal from each other so much is because they enjoy it! They enjoy being tricked and robbed of their not so hard earned cash. :think: Freaks! :crazy:

Good! I meant to.

And he just proved here what a crock of shit his budget is...

hell they think it's ok.. but... then there are a few real conservatives that are now questioning..

If the Robinsons want to make a good salary off Free Republic, that is FINE by me, but be honest about that! What is so hard about telling people who are all supposed to be Capitalists that you are providing them a service and making out handsomely from it? Why the lies? If they have Sheeple over there at FR who would object to the Robinsons making out handsomely from the web site, then they really ought not be a member there in the first place.

Or am I missing something?

And that must guzzle gasoline.

http://www.featherlitecoaches.com/flash_models/featherlite_flash.cfm?model=XLII

These damn things are expensive, like up to $1 million. :shrug:

Not sure if it was that pricey, though.

I saw some used "cheapies" for around $200,000

that is some large piece of bullshit. have those users never seen another forum, one where you can navigate and read threads with ease? shit, delphi does it better.

I would love to make that kind of money for 30 hrs a week! and, a hint here, asshole, people who only work 30 hrs a week don't get insurance either! and they don't get to set their own payrate to compensate for that! entitled asshole.

I can't get over how those nimrods aren't up in arms over the way RimJob is bilking them. :crazy:

I work with these types in my work place. Even though they are skilled workers, they'll work for $5.15 an hour if the boss decided to lower our wages.

no wonder they love Bush's lazy ass so much

I think they move that progress bar more slowly than receipts come in. Or used to. Now I think they have trouble making the goals they set.

And I hope we helped retard that progress a bit here, too!

Yeah, that is a good point.

Mainly, I don't trust anything I see on that site.

"Now, I do not slave over the site every day for 16+ hours 7 days a week 365.24 days a year. Sometimes I do little at all. At other times, I burn the midnight oil either because I feel inspired or because I'm fighting a fire or simply because that's the only opportuntity I have to impact the site with a server-intensive task. I figure I owe 30 hours a week, I aim for that and anything else I do is simply because I enjoy what I do. $48,000/year is justified: I pay my own income taxes, including the employer's side of FICA, I pay my own health benefits, I purchase my own resources (computers I personally use, books, lots of books), my business must carry liability insurance and we pay the "LLC" tax. Subtract those costs of doing business and it works out to a fair and comparable salary."


Actually, for the skill level and paying own benefits, that's not a great salary, but considering the being one's own boss and lack of full-time work, it's pretty damn good.


Edit: But wait, this is a quarterly fund drive????

I know that one of the things that really bugs me about that site is the fact that you can't view the discussions in a threaded format.

But it seems that this site only allows you to view it threaded. Am I missing something, or is there a way to view the postings in the order they are posted?

The problem is that you may come back to a discussion and it is difficult to see the latest/unread comments.

I am probably missing something.

I can't see how anyone could navigate through the thing...The set-up seems so ass-backwards.

But maybe that is the point! When you cannot search, you can hide your inconvenient history much better.

:evilgrin:

That should take care of all of FR's legitimate expenses.

Cleaning bills build up, ya know!

I've no doubt that FreeRepublic consumes that much money on traveling, housing, etc. But am grateful that Du admin is much better stewards of the community's funds. JimSpawn makes it sound like they're overwhelmed with work, even though it's clear that the site is trash.

The best part of DU is that people volunteer to keep the site nice (mods), while the people that work here (Elad, Skinner, EarlG) constantly improve the site. We have ads that don't interfere with using the site. We have members that are damned smart and good looking. Beautiful on the inside and out. To understand the difference between liberals and conservatives, all one has to do is look at the difference between what we have at DU and what they wallow in at FR.

Simply put, we're getting a hell of a lot more for our money.

lets remember to REWARD Skinner, Elad, and EarlG for the really stellar job they do and the efficient way they use the funds we donate.

Remember, WE employ them. Lets give the guys a raise!

I don't know that I consider myself their employer; it's more like I'm a subscriber. But they certainly do a fabulous job.

For a web site??? :wtf:

Not that the JimRobs probably mingle with the riffraff. :P

I considered taking a White Rose table to that Progressive conference up in Lake Geneva, WI... Would have cost us like $80.

Nobody should be surprised. Just look at who they support and voted for twice!

The issue is the code that runs Freep.dumb is so piss poor that it takes 8 servers to run it, 5 to deal with the shitty code, and 3 for the databse.

This hole thing reads like a "Love me, please" post

And even more amazing that they needed to come up with an elaborate justification.

They support a party of greed, Freeper Admins are just doing their duty to be consistent with GOP "values."

:silly: