Would you help pay for a dedicated server...

[Igiss]

Kane, payment is mainly for bandwith and fast & reliable connection that's difficult to achieve away from good datacenter. Let alone home. Hardware is important, but that's not the main issue - flserver was never adopted for server usage, it might as well run at any hi-end gaming PC with powerful processor and enough memory. Connection is the key. And support too.

My personal thoughts on this all? I was hosting server for a while and didn't pay much for traffic - prices are different here for many things. As we've got salaries 5-10 times less than in US for same job positions, you might easily calculate that $10 for me is equal to about $50 for anyone from US or western Europe, and this may apply to many other players around here, maybe to a least extent. I'd be willing to help because that's my mod, but I doubt that relying on donations is a safe idea.

Even if we do find 10 people willing to pay, what if next month some of them will leave? be unable to pay? or just forget? This will cause constant search for donors around here, which might result in rather unhealthy atmosphere on server. That's the last thing I would want.

As fewer people play Freelancer now than it was 1-2 years ago, I don't expect a huge flow of newcomers in any perspective. So I'm sorry but if we won't find sources to pay for this server from inside our current community, members really willing and capable of donating without demanding in-game benefits for themselves - we haven't got any more places to search.

I hope this won't get too personal. Donation arguments are number one reason why communities like this die.