Hello Mark

May I suggest a[nother] way for groups to get money for premium services?  I suggest that owners be given the option to have a "Sponsor our group" button on the group's home page.  This is basically a donate button, but the donations go directly to Groups.io (i.e. to you).

The system keeps track of the amount of money that was donated via each group.  At the end of a billing cycle, the group owner then has the option of combining his payment with some or all of the sponsored money, to buy another year of premium service.

So, for example, if a group managed to get $300 in sponsorship but they need only $220 for next year's premium membership, the owner then uses $220 of that $300, which reduces the available sponsorship to $80.  Or, if a group managed to get $100 in sponsorship but needs $220 for next year's premium membership, the group owner can pay $120 out of his own pocket, add the $100's credits, and the group's sponsorship counter goes back to zero.  Or, if a group did get $300 in sponsorship, but the owner decides to pay $170 of the $220 out of his own pocket anyway, the group's sponsorship counter drops to $200.

Sponsored money goes to Groups.io directly and it can't be "withdrawn" by the group owner.  If a group is shut down and they have sponsorship left over, they lose the money (or: perhaps the owner can select from a list of 5 or 10 charities, who then get a donation from Groups.io for that amount).  If a group drops from premium to basic (i.e. they no longer need the sponsorship money), the credits remain in the group's "account" and is not lost (in case the group later decides to go premium again), but the money can't be withdrawn.

The home page can also (at the owner's option) show how much money has been donated (sorry: sponsored) so far, and/or show a target (set by the owner) plus how close the group is to reaching the target.  The system need not keep track of *who* donated -- in fact, any member of the public can use the sponsorship button.  The group owner is not informed of who donated money -- only that sponsorship was received, and the owner can see the amount in his control panel (and if the owner chose to make this information visible on the group's home page, then members of the public can also see how much has been sponsored so far).

If it's not too hard to implement, it would be nice if group owners could donate their credits to other groups.
And if it's not too hard to implement, you can consider allowing sponsors to enter their e-mail address when donating, and letting the group owner know not just the amount but also the identity of the sponsor.

Samuel

On Wed, Jan 6, 2021 at 04:51 AM, KWKloeber wrote:

It would be best if all of the attributes (badges?) shown on the member list are available in the drop-down filter. 

I agree additional filtering options would be useful at times and until that is implemented a simple workaround is:

• On your member list, click the Download button
• Select all text on the displayed list and copy to your clipboard
• Paste that text into a new Excel worksheet
• Use the 'Text to columns' feature (normally found on the Data tab) to split the text into columns (delimited by a command and using " as the text delimiter)
• Filter the columns in Excel

The advantage of Excel filtering is that you can combine multiple filters and if you put your data into an Excel table then you can use all the whizzy stuff like pivot tables and slicers.

Andy

Today I needed to 'un-moderate' two members.  Luckily, the first's name and email address was listed near the top of the ADMIN > MEMBERS list.  no problem-o.  The second, I realized, was tucked away somewhere in the list and I didn't even remember the name or email address.  Just by happenstance it was on one of the top pages as I paged down the member list.  If it wasn't, I would have been going through 1,600+ names trying to find one with an "M" next to the name.  Not very good.

It would be best if all of the attributes (badges?) shown on the member list are available in the drop-down filter.  I don't see why SOME would have been implemented without ALL being implemented.  Not logical.

From the GM forum:

...It would be nice to be able to somehow filter the list based on any of these status badges. 

...it would be very helpful to be able to filter on badges, not just member status badges but also sub preferences badges as well, any available/shown badge in that list.
... I have often wished to be able to easily identify everyone who is not confirmed (NC).
... I've also sometimes wondered by Banned was not implemented as a badge.



 

I've searched for other discussion to no avail. I've exported a Databases table to both JSON and CSV and imported same. In both cases, the images within Image-type fields are lost. JSON import simply has the image file name and a broken image icon. Both the exported JSON and CSV files have just the image file name - no URL.

Is this a known bug or unsupported feature?

Tom

On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 03:30 PM, Jim Fisher wrote:

I haven't tried this (don't use a database on groups.io), but can't you
achieve thiis now by using CTRL + End ?

If you have a keyboard. :-) Let's not leave mobile users out.

There's an example database here in the beta@ group that shows a Google Maps integration. When you scroll it, the map doesn't scroll. Maybe another alternative is to put all buttons at the top, and make them non-scrollable as well.

JohnF

On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 06:01 PM, Mark Fletcher wrote:

Instead of storing a message that requires a change in the subject because of group hashtag policies, we now just bounce it back to the sender, like we do in other instances (messages to groups from non-members, for example). This should prevent any weird corner cases, like I believe what was being seen above.

Mark -- I agree that simply bouncing it is preferable to holding it as a Draft....that is, after all, what the setting says will happen.

I'd be interested to know what the resulting bounce message says.

Thanks,
Bruce

I haven't tried this (don't use a database on groups.io), but can't you achieve
thiis now by using CTRL + End ?

Jim Fisher

Hi All,

For those who celebrated, I hope you all had a nice holiday. I admit that I mostly only skimmed this discussion during that time, as I tried to stay away from the computer for a bit.

I am going to close this topic right now and will more closely review the discussion. I'll summarize in the next day or so.

Thanks!
Mark

On 05/01/2021 04:14, Drew wrote:

I'm sure some would be able to set up their multiple email addresses for multiple groups in order to avoid the $5 or $10 per year fee, and manage to keep it all straight but, really? To save $10 per year????

I've have four or five addresses on Groups.IO, because list-owners dutifully added those addresses, and I haven't set up a login on Groups.IO for those excess addresses.

jonathon

On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 12:20 PM, Chris Jones wrote:

For many the absence of advertisements and tracking was a key reason for migrating to groups.io in the first place; both absences were "trumpeted" by Mark.

The lack of adverts and tracking was also a key motivator for my club to switch to Groups.io.

I would be deeply dismayed if there was a move to monetise Groups.io (or any part thereof).

I am not suggesting adverts if that's what you mean by monetise?  What I am saying that the lack of adverts and tracking is a saleable feature so make Basic groups chargeable. if you don't want to pay anything then there are other platforms that claim to be free,  Of course, they're not really free, the price you pay is having to suffer advertising and tracking.

Have a trial period by all means but after that, people should pay for the level of service they use.

No and yes in that order. :)

I take it that means you are not in favour of trial periods?

The planned pricing structure change from 18-Jan does mean there is a big step from Basic (I'll avoid the 'F' word) to Premium group.  Some level of intermediate group may be preferable and I would also look at splitting the Collaboration Suite. There are currently 7 features in that  (Polls, Calendar, Chat, Database, Photos, Files & Wiki) so perhaps split them into two sets with one of the more popular features in the set attached to Premium groups to entice people to upgrade. A more flexible approach may be to price each of the features separately to allow a fully customisable set with the most popular features attracting a higher price.

Arguably messy.

But perfectly doable and will give group owners the ability to create a group with the functions that meet their needs.

At the end of the day, I believe that group owners are those that should be liable to pay for their groups. If an owner has created a group for others (because they have the technical skills to do that) and doesn't want to be on the hook for the cost then a simple solution would be to promote someone else to owner and demote themselves to a Member or a Moderator. 

That assumes that they can find someone willing to pony up to meet group costs. Big assumption IMHO.

Then let the group be downgraded and see what the members think. Perhaps when they lose features they may start to appreciate the value of what they had.   If an owner keeps paying then there's no incentive for anyone else to do anything.  If nobody does then you have to question the value and reason for doing it in the first place. 

if subscribers had to pay a small fee for their Accounts (as I have previously suggested) the question of a groups such as GMF attracting a charge simply doesn't arise. What could arise is owners and moderators who have second accounts for test and "as the members see it" purposes finding themselves paying for their second accounts, but that is not insurmountable.

I think having members pay for their accounts would create utter confusion. My group members already pay (in effect) as they pay club membership fees and the club then pays for a premium group (or reimburses me to be exact). I'm sure a good many wouldn't even consider they had an account at Groups.io as they just use email.  Then we get into how many groups can account belong to and complex solutions such at that suggested by Samuel Murrayy (with two Ys since the start of last year I noticed) earlier in this topic.

I say keep it simple, let the the group owners pay and charge for basic groups.  I'd much rather see charges for Basic groups than higher prices for Premium and Enterprise groups to subsidise them.  As Mark has already confirmed, he's pretty much on his own apart from Nina doing the documentation.  The less time he needs spend on finance admin, the more time he can devote to Groups.io features and extras like the Apps (and I would expect there to be a nominal fee for those too after all time and effort being invested in them).


Regards
Andy

Our organization recently switched a bunch of lists from Mailman2 to groups.io. One user presented the following issue: they used to get a Mailman MIME digest, and, with Outlook, were able to file individual messages from the digest into Outlook folders. They can no longer do that. The best suggestion I was able to come up with was for them to subscribe to individual messages and use an Outlook filter to dump all the messages from a list into a separate folder for perusal later.

I see that there was some discussion of MIME digests in the past: https://beta.groups.io/g/main/topic/1436074
and of a Send To Me feature, which was never added: https://beta.groups.io/g/main/topic/2195268

If anyone has some other suggestions I be interested. Thanks.

On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 10:26 AM, Andy Wedge wrote:

Mark has ruled out adverting but that along with no tracking cookies are marketable features and money can be made from that.

For many the absence of advertisements and tracking was a key reason for migrating to groups.io in the first place; both absences were "trumpeted" by Mark. I would be deeply dismayed if there was a move to monetise Groups.io (or any part thereof). That aside, as Mark noted earlier in this thread "adverts by email" don't work very well.

Have a trial period by all means but after that, people should pay for the level of service they use.

No and yes in that order. :)

The planned pricing structure change from 18-Jan does mean there is a big step from Basic (I'll avoid the 'F' word) to Premium group.  Some level of intermediate group may be preferable and I would also look at splitting the Collaboration Suite. There are currently 7 features in that  (Polls, Calendar, Chat, Database, Photos, Files & Wiki) so perhaps split them into two sets with one of the more popular features in the set attached to Premium groups to entice people to upgrade. A more flexible approach may be to price each of the features separately to allow a fully customisable set with the most popular features attracting a higher price.

Arguably messy.

  Of course, if most users are email only, this may have little impact.

Quite.

At the end of the day, I believe that group owners are those that should be liable to pay for their groups. If an owner has created a group for others (because they have the technical skills to do that) and doesn't want to be on the hook for the cost then a simple solution would be to promote someone else to owner and demote themselves to a Member or a Moderator. 

That assumes that they can find someone willing to pony up to meet group costs. Big assumption IMHO.

There are very good cases for Groups.io to waive the cost of certain groups such as GMF and Group_Help as they provide a service to others and are cost effective in terms of reducing the number of support queries raised directly.

Clearly true, but if subscribers had to pay a small fee for their Accounts (as I have previously suggested) the question of a groups such as GMF atttracting a charge simply doesn't arise. What could arise is owners and moderators who have second accounts for test and "as the members see it" purposes finding themselves paying for their second accounts, but that is not insurmountable.

Chris

As an informational aside: at 55 cents a member, under the new charging structure, a new Premium group with 1820 members will cost its owner $1000 per year (annual payment) - I don't know how many groups exceed this. Looking at the list of public groups, there are 10 exceeding 18,200 (so cost > $10,000), for the largest, cost > $36,000.

How many group owners could afford to be in that league? How many group owners would start their group(s) with the deliberate intention of staying out of it?

Jeremy

On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 01:06 AM, Jeremy H wrote:

Groups.io, Inc's service - providing the underlying system - is, of itself, of no end value: it only becomes valuable because people (group owners) are prepared to run groups,

I don't necessarily disagree with that. The value of the various aspects of what Groups.io offers will vary depending upon how people interact with the service provided. For email only users, the Groups.io website may be irrelevant for example.

in summary, the question for Mark is whether he is in a B2B (to business) or B2C (to consumer) market? (And whether he expects group owners to be 'businesses' or 'consumers'?)  

I think it goes beyond that and also depends upon Mark's long term ambitions for Groups.io. Does he want to keep it going enough to make a living from it as long as possible and then maybe let it fade away or does he want to build it up and eventually sell it off so he can retire? Either way, it costs money to run and costs need to be covered.

Mark has ruled out adverting but that along with no tracking cookies are marketable features and money can be made from that. Have a trial period by all means but after that, people should pay for the level of service they use.

The planned pricing structure change from 18-Jan does mean there is a big step from Basic (I'll avoid the 'F' word) to Premium group.  Some level of intermediate group may be preferable and I would also look at splitting the Collaboration Suite. There are currently 7 features in that  (Polls, Calendar, Chat, Database, Photos, Files & Wiki) so perhaps split them into two sets with one of the more popular features in the set attached to Premium groups to entice people to upgrade. A more flexible approach may be to price each of the features separately to allow a fully customisable set with the most popular features attracting a higher price.  Of course, if most users are email only, this may have little impact.

At the end of the day, I believe that group owners are those that should be liable to pay for their groups. If an owner has created a group for others (because they have the technical skills to do that) and doesn't want to be on the hook for the cost then a simple solution would be to promote someone else to owner and demote themselves to a Member or a Moderator.  There are very good cases for Groups.io to waive the cost of certain groups such as GMF and Group_Help as they provide a service to others and are cost effective in terms of reducing the number of support queries raised directly.

Andy

On 12/31/20 17:36, Chris Jones via groups.io wrote:

On Thu, Dec 31, 2020 at 09:27 PM, Drew wrote:
Up to 3 groups: FREE
4 to 10 groups: $5.00/yr
More than 10 groups: $10.00/yr
Superficially attractive, certainly. but it includes a major flaw.
I have 2 email addresses immediately available, and I could set up 4 or 5 more without it costing me anything. That would immediately give me access to 20 or so groups without it costing me a single, solitary, bean.

A large portion of the hand-holding that our group owners do is untangling the mess that subscribers cause for themselves by using multiple email addresses, not knowing which they are posting from and why they keep receiving individual messages after they (think) they have switched to digest, etc., etc.

I'm sure some would be able to set up their multiple email addresses for multiple groups in order to avoid the $5 or $10 per year fee, and manage to keep it all straight but, really? To save $10 per year????

Drew

On Mon, Jan 4, 2021 at 06:01 PM, Jeremy H wrote:

you're puttting money into your group, instead of giving it Cats Protection,

Actually I do both. ;)
 
--
J

Messages are the sole opinion of the author, especially the fishy ones.
My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together. - Desmond Tutu

My compliments. And yes, it is a dichotomy which ignores a grey area in the middle - I would accept there are many group owners who run their groups for similar motives, and so get non-financial recompense. But I would say that perhaps what you are doing is runing your own private charity (not something to criticise), as a form of business - you're puttting money into your group, instead of giving it Cats Protection, or whatever, for them to give it back to you, for you to do the good you do.

Jeremy