Premier Membership, Major Update, July 1, 2004 Options

[Dimensioneer]

Premier Membership Processing Request Form

Please read all information below before clicking on link to form above.


First, I am going to preface this information by answering what will likely be the biggest questions that will arise:

"Is BZPower's forum members-only?" No.
"Do I have to pay money to use BZP?" No.
"If I don't pay to be a Premier Member, am I going to get kicked off of BZP?" No.

Okay, with that out of the way, let me now begin.

In less than six months, BionicleZone Community (now BZPower) grew in ways that I could have never imagined: over 900 members and tens of thousands of posts took their toll on the limits of my service provider.

I had gladly donated the money it costed to keep BZP online. But with piping over 1/2 a gigabyte of data every day, my generous provider finally had to drop the bomb on me: pay up or get out (he actually phrased it much nicer than that, but that's what it boils down to).

[UPDATE: BZPower now consumes nearly three five that bandwidth; 2.3 gigabytes transferred daily!]

Well, obviously BZP didn't go offline, so that means that my cost of keeping us online has increased by over 200%.

We couldn't afford to soak up those costs and keep our families fed at the same time, so I had two options: take BZP offline, or create a small stream of revenue to defray the costs.

So, starting in January 2002, BZ activated the Premier Membership Program.

"So what does that mean?"

Members who choose to upgrade their account to Premier Member will keep all of their current permissions, and then some.

Among the features of a Premier Member over a Standard Member are:

• Premier Member Group Affiliation
• Custom Member Level Images (Masks, Tools, Discs, etc.)
• Exclusive "Premier Member" Indicator in Forum View
• File Attachments in All Forums
• Ability to Start Polls
• Ability to Start Topics in Bionicle Trivia
• Your Own BZPower Blog
• BZPower.com Vanity Email Address Forwarder
• Five Times the Standard Private Message Storage Capacity (1000 vs. 200)
• Ability to Upload a Custom Avatar Directly to BZPower ( 90kb filesize limit )
• 45 days between name changes instead of 90
• More Features in the Planning Stages

But above all, becoming a Premier Member is a way to say, "I appreciate BZPower, and I am willing to do my small part to ensure that it will be around in the future."

"So enough yapping about the benefits, how much're you soaking me for?"

In a perfect world, every member of BZP would feel the need to support the community, and I'd only need about $1 per person and be set for some time. But as we all know, we don't live in a perfect world. Since I'm not making Premier Membership a requirement, and some folks just simply don't believe in paying for access to any website, regardless of how much they might benefit from it, I have to set the price of the membership accordingly.

Six Month Premier Membership: $7 Donation
One Year Premier Membership: $11 Donation
Lifetime* Premier Membership: $35 Donation


While all funds must be in USD, if you're curious what amount that is in your local currency, you can check this site's currency converter.

NOTE: Except for the Lifetime option, BZP does not establish Premier Memberships for a period of more than twelve months. Any amount sent in excess of a one-year membership, but less than a lifetime membership, will be absorbed as an additional donation and treated as a one-year membership.

"So how can I send my money?"

In the stone age, members wishing to upgrade to Premier status had to do everything manually, but those days are gone.

You still have the option of sending funds either via postal service or by PayPal (and we still request an additional 50 cents to help us defray PayPal acceptance fees), but now all you have to do is fill in a few blanks & click a couple of times.

Just read everything carefully and follow all of the instructions provided. Premier Membership Processing Requests which do not provide all of the required information are subject to being rejected and returned.

LINK >> Premier Membership Processing Request Form


Thanks for your time!

PREMIER MEMBERSHIP DISCLAIMER

The BZPower Premier Membership Program is exercised on a strictly voluntary basis, and any and all funds solicited by the program are donations contributed and accepted in good will. Contributions do not represent any binding contract of goods or services, and should either party choose to terminate membership for any reason, Premier Membership status is non-transferrable and non-upgradable. Funds are non-refundable in whole or in part.

* "Lifetime" membership refers to the life of BZPower, not the life of the contributor.