MetaFilter

📢📢📢 Fundraiser Update 3: With your help, we’re charting a way forward

Wow, this is another great chapter in what makes Metafilter Metafilter. Once again the community is pulling together to get things done. Fantastic news.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 5:24 PM on November 16, 2022

Umm, is Metafilter going to have to pay taxes on the $64,594.89 in one-time contributions that it just received? Is there some way to shelter that money so it's available for future expenses?

(Sorry if I missed previous discussion of corporate structure.)
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 5:42 PM on November 16, 2022

RichardP, thank you for that extensive answer. It didn’t occur to me that these contributions could be considered gifts for tax purposes rather than straight up revenue.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 7:20 PM on November 16, 2022

MetaFilter probably can exclude the gifts from its taxable income, but since this will likely cause MetaFIlter's income to significantly differ from the reported income on the 1099s sent to the IRS, the IRS may contact MetaFilter for more information.

If Metafilter intends contributions beyond the $5 signup fee to be considered gifts, it feels like the contribution form should include a statement to that effect, with an indication that the contributor… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 6:49 AM on November 17, 2022

Welcome newbs and noobs

Join 7,527 readers in helping fund MetaFilter

Does that number refer to the number of recurring donors, or to the number of members who have made a donation at some point in time, recurring or otherwise?

Also, is there a live ticker somewhere that shows the current value?
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 6:04 AM on November 12, 2022

Ah, thank you hangashore.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 8:29 AM on November 12, 2022

Metafilter Wants You - The Fundraising Post!

TL/DR, but do we contact people via email when their recurring contribution stops? If you believe this is often accidental, it would be worth a checkin. Maybe add an opt-in checkbox for receiving that email when people sign up to contribute.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 10:59 AM on October 25, 2022

Endow it with enough capital to operate on dividends.

Gandhi argued against endowments. He didn't want one for his organization. He felt that endowments could led to stagnation, and parasitism. Organizations remain vital by continuing to prove their worth to their membership.

That said, don't let me talk you out of your million dollar contribution!
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 10:11 AM on October 27, 2022

Ask Metafilter Answer-ers and Reading the Question

I agree with the OP that there too many questions about baseball on AskMe. I don’t think we need a technical solution to reduce the number of baseball questions, though. That seems like overkill. People should just pay more attention.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 6:15 PM on September 12, 2022

DirtyOldTown, bingo on answer #4.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 6:41 PM on September 13, 2022

"Series" rather than "TV" on Fanfare?

Let's just make a carbon copy of the TV category and call it Series.
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 1:17 PM on June 23, 2022

[MeFi Site Update] June 22nd

Related to site marketing: I noticed that Google is not indexing all of AskMe. Is this a known thing? Do we tell Google to only index the above-the-fold portion of questions?

One example is that searching for "paper airplanes" site:ask.metafilter.com does not return The Stupidest Miracle.

(When I checked this previously, it also didn't return that page when searching for "airplane". I haven't taken the time to reverify… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 5:54 AM on June 23, 2022

Amazing. It's 2022 and I'm still learning how Google works (and doesn't work).
posted to MetaTalk by Winnie the Proust at 7:41 AM on June 23, 2022