Word from Vic @
www.I-BMW.com

The new year is here..2005 and it’s time again to ask for your support in order to sustain this community for the 2005-2006 window.

The technical existence of this community is the result of the efforts of a handful of Administrators who put together the computing equipment, software and their personal time to make it function. All of the technical function of the board would mean nothing without the guidance of a group of dedicated Moderators who help keep the community operating & motivated within our "loose" site guidelines. Even with the dedicated Administrators and Moderators however, we'd be nowhere without membership; the real heart and soul of our community and from where we sustain our existence.

All of the Administrators and Moderators do their jobs as unpaid volunteers. We all do this because we enjoy, believe in and support this passionate community. Unfortunately we still have significant expenses even though we have no labor costs. The only mechanism we have for supporting these expenses is through the voluntary donations from our members.

Some of you may have noticed some changes we have made to the site over the last year. We purchased some new equipment and moved it to a faster and more reliable (and more expensive) co-location facility. The result has been significantly improved speed of operation and significantly improved uptime. We have also undertaken some significant improvement in the software and function of this site. Many of you may have noticed our new chat client, improvements in the function of our PM system and a substantial improvement in the way we handle attachments to posts.

We have many more projects/updates underway that will make this community even more useful for our members including a new calendar & photo page plug-in. Many of the things we do are accompanied by commensurate software licensing costs with some of the proposed features requiring additional licensing ($).

While we bought a new server earlier this year we still need to purchase more equipment. These equipment needs are to support the growth of the community and to enhance our long term stability and reliability. We have come a long way from our beginnings in 1998 on a small garage server as evidenced by our 5,600 user (& counting) base which although fantastic, presents a significant load on our technical resources.

OK... We need your help in supporting this site!

Please, every dollar goes a long way.
Can't afford $20/year for this portal subscription? No worries, $10 will also suffice. Where else are you going to find such benefit for so little money?

Just like PBS we operate through the voluntary donations from our members. If you use and enjoy this site even occasionally, please take a few minutes and either click the PayPal donate button found at the bottom of every page -or- send a check in any amount, to the address below. In this season of giving, give yourself and fellow community members a gift of support for one of the best and longest lived motorcycling communities on the web. Consider as well that the last such "drive" was 1.5 years back perhaps illustrating our reluctance to ask, however, we can no longer wait.

There are two ways to donate through secure PayPal.com:
(1) Through the "PayPal Donate" button found on the footer of every I-BMW.com forum's page
or:
(2) http://www.PayPal.com & choose "Send Money" to: vsalemme@earthlink.net

With your donation you may also choose to use our email services which can get you a vanity email address yourname@I-BMW.com ­or- yourname@K1200.com or your own webspace on our servers. Should you wish Email capability or a factory maintenance CD & reflective sticker in consideration for your generous donation, just ask & we'll make it happen!

Thanks for your support gang, and should you aspire to the "check is in the mail" genre:



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Give if you can....
Vic Salemme
POB 24
Concord Mass 01742