gtluke
The Moped
First, I hate banks. And I can't wait for them to go the way of blockbuster video. (see my ramblings in the cryptocurrency threads)
Second, I know talking about money isn't a societal norm but I figured it's okay since we're talking about a massive 3 digits.
Third, I'm not complaining, I'm just looking for some creative feedback here.
I've had my PNC business bank account since I dunno, 2005ish when I was operating a mechanic garage.
It was a free business checking as long as I had $500 in the account. Seems normal, seems fair.
At the beginning of 2017 PNC changed the rules of my agreement (without my consent) and It's now $10 a month no matter what and minimum of $2,500 in my account or I get a fee.
Well, I wasn't aware that they changed the rules mid game because I only check my banking statement at tax time. Well PNC was stealing like $25 a month out of my account all year. I went into the branch, talked to some nice lady. They returned like 3 months worth of fees and said they will look into if they can return more. I haven't heard back.
So it looks like this week I have to go in and close my account. There is no way I'm doing any kind of business with these shady ass people. How rude.
So I could just switch my accounting to my personal account, that's fine. But now this year Smugmug has upped it's business account rate from $250 to $360. I think when I started it was $80 :\
With SSAP dead, DH40 dead, and I'm going to be out of town for the Lewis Morris Challenge those were the events that I actually sold photos at. Probably because they brought in more people that aren't the regulars that already have a dozen of my photos.
So with smugmug taking 20% of my sales right off the top to deal with credit card fees and further profit taking and charging me $360 a year I'll be lucky to break even for 2018 and basically donate beautiful spring days to sitting in the dirt.
Ugh.
I'll be at the MTBNJ events taking photos no matter what. But I'd like some opinions on a donation based system. I know 75% of people would take photos without donating but I think even at that rate I'd come out ahead. And maybe if I eliminated the burden of actually trying to sell photos I could get more creative and get a lot of shots I wish I could get. Like start line, finish line type stuff. But it's impossible to get a photo of the starting line AND the rider on the course. So I always opted to get individual photos of each racer instead.
I think for 2018 I'm covered since my current smugmug subscription ends in August unless you guys think it's worth me to take down the paywall now.
I'm not looking to actually make any money on this but keeping the system going costs a lot of time/cash. This year I sunk a bunch of cash into the raid hard drives that keep the original backups of all the photos, I'm at about 1TB of just biking photos. Maybe I should have just nuked the old ones, or compressed them to jpg but I think it's worth keeping them I guess.
We're so close to making this work over a decentralized cryptocurrency marketplace but it's just not there yet. If it was easier to flick me a few bucks for your photo I think more people would do it, or if a commerce website didn't' cost me $500 a year to operate.
Frustrating.
Second, I know talking about money isn't a societal norm but I figured it's okay since we're talking about a massive 3 digits.
Third, I'm not complaining, I'm just looking for some creative feedback here.
I've had my PNC business bank account since I dunno, 2005ish when I was operating a mechanic garage.
It was a free business checking as long as I had $500 in the account. Seems normal, seems fair.
At the beginning of 2017 PNC changed the rules of my agreement (without my consent) and It's now $10 a month no matter what and minimum of $2,500 in my account or I get a fee.
Well, I wasn't aware that they changed the rules mid game because I only check my banking statement at tax time. Well PNC was stealing like $25 a month out of my account all year. I went into the branch, talked to some nice lady. They returned like 3 months worth of fees and said they will look into if they can return more. I haven't heard back.
So it looks like this week I have to go in and close my account. There is no way I'm doing any kind of business with these shady ass people. How rude.
So I could just switch my accounting to my personal account, that's fine. But now this year Smugmug has upped it's business account rate from $250 to $360. I think when I started it was $80 :\
With SSAP dead, DH40 dead, and I'm going to be out of town for the Lewis Morris Challenge those were the events that I actually sold photos at. Probably because they brought in more people that aren't the regulars that already have a dozen of my photos.
So with smugmug taking 20% of my sales right off the top to deal with credit card fees and further profit taking and charging me $360 a year I'll be lucky to break even for 2018 and basically donate beautiful spring days to sitting in the dirt.
Ugh.
I'll be at the MTBNJ events taking photos no matter what. But I'd like some opinions on a donation based system. I know 75% of people would take photos without donating but I think even at that rate I'd come out ahead. And maybe if I eliminated the burden of actually trying to sell photos I could get more creative and get a lot of shots I wish I could get. Like start line, finish line type stuff. But it's impossible to get a photo of the starting line AND the rider on the course. So I always opted to get individual photos of each racer instead.
I think for 2018 I'm covered since my current smugmug subscription ends in August unless you guys think it's worth me to take down the paywall now.
I'm not looking to actually make any money on this but keeping the system going costs a lot of time/cash. This year I sunk a bunch of cash into the raid hard drives that keep the original backups of all the photos, I'm at about 1TB of just biking photos. Maybe I should have just nuked the old ones, or compressed them to jpg but I think it's worth keeping them I guess.
We're so close to making this work over a decentralized cryptocurrency marketplace but it's just not there yet. If it was easier to flick me a few bucks for your photo I think more people would do it, or if a commerce website didn't' cost me $500 a year to operate.
Frustrating.
