[HCoop-Discuss] Reduced rate qualifications

[Davor Ocelic]

On Fri, 21 Jul 2006 11:42:10 -0400
Nathan Kennedy <ntk at hcoop.net> wrote:

> A handful of 
> our members consume most of the bandwidth and disk space usage, a large 
> group falls in the middle with moderate usage, and a small group uses 
> practically no resources.

Maybe I am too idealistic here, but I wouldn't like to see us getting
into any kind of usage- or status-based divisions.

What attracted me to HCoop in the first place was the simple & elegant
scheme that everything was based on. Take expenses, divide by number of
members and that's it.

*Maybe* it would make sense to charge extra for people who would use
faaar more resources than planned (like 20 out of total 160 GB disk
space, or say, 15% of our total bandwidth allowance). But such
people should just be special cases, and billed like regular users,
plus their determined extra amount. They shouldn't affect our simple
costs-division scheme.

Furthermore,
I *would* like to see HCoop getting some extra money for future
expansion etc., but that could be conducted over a longer period of
time (a year or two) on all members equally, and combined with those
who would eventually pay extra based on exceptional usage, it would
result in a nice total amount without noticeably raising monthly
per-member cost. (I think the suggested minimum of $5 per month is
too much, especially if you only get a half-featured account).

> My idea is to offer those in the last group a flat rate of $5 per month 
> as long as they keep usage low.  To qualify for that rate they would 
> probably have to have their disk quota set low (about 50M) and use 
> minimal web bandwidth, as little as 15M per month, and should also have 
> email forwarded with no IMAP or Squirrelmail access.

I am strongly against cutting on features. Usage maybe, but not features.
Handicapped accounts are a waste of everyone's time and money.
The idea seems so bad to me that I couldn't decide which aspect of it to
criticise first.

Have a fun day everyone!
-doc